The Gender Bender Incident
by xXCobalt Kitsune-chanXx
Summary: Thanks to a strange potion made by Komui that was placed in Allen's food, Allen is no longer a he, but a she. Things quickly derail as Allen tries to adjust to life as a female exorcist and figure out why Lavi and Kanda are acting so strangely around him.
1. Chapter 1

A/N- A DGM fic, wow! This is my first time writing in this catergory, so don't roast me on a stick if it sucks ass. I've read all the DGM chapters released so far and I just thought to myself- "Hey...not enough crackish yaoi." So here's your crackish yaoi. Enjoy.

I'm planning for this story to be a Lavi/Allen/Kanda triangle (the triangle of utter bishiness...) but I'm going to put this under Allen/Lavi. That doesn't necessarily mean that's what the pairing will end up being (that, my friend is up to reviewer support and opinion. plus the amount of imagination and inspiration I accumulate as I write this story).

There will be a slight Allen harem (I just can't get enough of that cute lil' exorcist) so be forewarned. Things will get a little hectic. *sigh*

Disclaimer- I will never own DGM, for I do not possess the money or awesome skillz to have a manga to do so. T___T

Enjoy, fellow fangirls, fanboys, and bored readers alike.

* * *

**Chapter One**

**Harmless Tinkering**

**---**

It had been a particularly quiet day at the Black Order. There were no sneak attacks from the Noah and Millennium Earl, not as many akuma prowling the streets, and far less explosions and fights going on within its stone walls. Everyone, exorcist and finder alike, was enjoying the momentary peace and making the most of it. Catching up on a novel, chatting with friends, or finally getting to those errands they had 'forgotten' about.

Everyone, except for a certain mad scientist with a sister complex.

Said scientist was bored. Bored out of his wits. Dear, sweet Lenalee-chan was still out on her mission with Noise, retrieving an Innocence fragment from a nearby village. Sister complex kicking in, Komui felt lonesome and rather bored with the silence. His mind frittered between dealing with the boredom and whether or whether not he should go over to the village and check to see if Lenalee was okay. And by okay he meant no injuries, no dirt, and especially NO BOYS. Well...Noise didn't count. He's blind, so it's not like he's going to be leering at Lenalee-chan anytime soon.

Thus, he shut himself off his private lab. Not to weep over the absence of his sister, but for something much worse. Komui was in his laboratory, tinkering with his various potions and concoctions. This harmless tinkering had given birth to incidents in the Black Order such as Komurin 1 & 2, Komurin X, and that crazy vitamin that nearly turned everyone in the black order into mindless zombie slaves to a crazed ghost.

The memories of those incidents had been burned into the minds Black Order faculty and staff. All were warned to take heed of supervisor Komui and his innocent "tinkering". For if they didn't, surely, heads were going to roll.

However, on this quiet day everyone had forgotten to keep watch of Komui and his tinkering, busying themselves with their own activities and problems. So, with no one to stop him, the white-capped man trudged into his lab, shut the door, and locked it.

All hope was lost.

Six and a half hours later, the door slammed open, Komui stepped out, brandishing a sweet, pink-colored potion up the air. Eyes gleaming with self accomplishment, he cried out. "It's done! It's finally done! Elixir No.473 is finally done!!"

Silence.

In his head, Komui had expected to be welcomed by cheering, rounds of applausal, pats on the back coupled with a "Job well done.". But he got none. His smiled wilted slightly then he began skipping off in the direction of the cafeteria. Perhaps his good friend, Jerry, would show more approval and appreciation than those mute walls had.

Stupid walls.

---

_Cafeteria- In the Kitchen_

"Uwauh! Komui-kun, this is so cute! It's wonderful!" Jerry exclaimed, two hands placed on either side of his face while making an 'o' shape with his mouth. Komui nodded, finally happy to get some praise.

"Isn't it, Jerry-san? I spent over six hours working on this potion. All the while thinking of Lenalee-chan to keep my spirits up." Jerry aww'ed.

"You're such an amazing older brother, Komui-kun!" Komui nodded again and made a "cool guy" thinking face.

"I am, aren't I."

"Komui-kun, just wondering...but, what does it do?" Jerry asked. The maker of the potion blinked.

"Excuse me?"

"The potion. What does it do?" Jerry asked again.

Komui smiled and turned. With a glint of his glasses, he answered. "I have absolutely no clue." Jerry made another 'o' face.

"Whaaaaaaaaat? How can you not know what it does?" Komui shrugged.

"I was too busy mixing and whatnot that I lost track of what exactly I put in. Therefore, I'm not sure of its outcome when someone consumes it." Jerry nodded.

"So then how do you know that it's finished?" The scientist chuckled.

"A true scientist knows when his works are completed. It's a intricate and complex connection between the maker and the makee."

"That's incredible, Komui-kun. I didn't know there was such a depth in alchemy. It reminds me of cooking in a way. Somehow you just _know _when the food is ready." Jerry and Komui nodded simultaneously, both caught up in their own words.

"Yes, well, Jerry-san, as a token of our friendship, I'd like you to have this potion." Komui handed Jerry the pink elixir.

"Komui-kun, I'm honored!" Jerry cried out, bringing his friend into a back-breaking hug.

Many hugs and declarations of friendship later...

"Buh-bye, Komui-kun~!" Jerry said, waving his hand. "Hmm, it smells scrumptious. I wonder if I could use it in some of my cooking. Buu, there's only enough for one serving though. Oh well. I bet Allen-kun would love it!"

---

"Baka Kanda! My name is Allen! Allen Walker!" a short, white-haired exorcist yelled.

"Che. Kobayashi." the taller black-haired exorcist retorted. The shorter one scowled and walked off into the line forming towards the kitchen as they entered the cafeteria.

"Hi, Jerry-san. What's on the menu?" he asked with a bright (and hungry) look on his face. Jerry grinned.

"Oh something very special. It's a limited time offer too. I've only made one of this special surprise. Would you like to be the lucky one and try it, Allen-kun?" Allen nodded.

"Of course! Everything you make is delicious." Jerry smiled and handed Allen a plate with a single slice of cake on it.

"You flatter me too much, Allen-kun! Enjoy!" He said with a red face, shooing away the boy. 'Mm, this looks really good!' Allen thought, taking a seat. The person beside him let out a low growl.

"Why're you sitting here, kobayashi?" Kanda glared. Allen ignored the older teen and took a bite out of the slice of cake. '...S-sugoi!!' It was like an explosion of sweet and savory tastes. The icing was light and melted quickly in his mouth, but actual cake kicked in with its own variety of flavor. Allen closed his eyes, taking a brief moment to enjoy the individuals tastes.

_"Listen up, baka-student. Real men take time to enjoy the wine. So stop horking down your food like that! It's disgusting! ENJOY THE DAMN WINE!" _Allen mentally sweatdropped, remembering the piece of (drunken) wisdom his demon master had shared with him long ago. 'I'm enjoying the wine now, Master...or rather cake. Happy now?' His stomach growled. 'Okay, I've gotten enough enjoyment. Time to eat.'

And with that the slice of cake was gone in a matter of seconds. He clapped his hands together. "Thank you for the meal."

_Gurgle..._

'That doesn't sound too good...' As if on cue, Allen's stomach began twisting and turning sour. "Augh!" he cried, clutching his stomach. Kanda glared at him again.

"Oi, kobayashi, go to the restroom or something. I'm trying to eat my soba." Without complaint, Allen got up and ran off in the direction of the restroom. 'Che.' Kanda thought, picking up his chopsticks-

"YUU~"

_GLOMP!_

_PUNCH! KICK! OTHER PAINFUL VERBS!_

"Baka-usagi! What was that for!?" Kanda demanded to the bruised redhead on the floor. Instantly recovering, Lavi shrugged.

"I don't know. Just bored, I guess," Kanda growled dangerously.

"Bak-" Lavi interrupted him.

"Oi, where's Allen? It's around lunchtime and he's usually here pigging out." Kanda scowled, re-picking up his chopsticks.

"How the hell should I know? The idiot ran off to the restroom."

"Okay. Thanks Yuu!" he quickly ran off before Kanda could beat the crap out of him again.

---

'Ohh...I don't feel so good...' Allen thought as he flushed the toilet. He'd sat there for quite a while but (ahem) nothing happened. 'Did I get the stomach flu or something? No, I felt fine before I ate Jerry-san's special- the cake! Of course, it was the cake! I gotta go find out just what the hell was in that cake- AUGH! MY STOMACH!'

_Ten Minutes Later_

"Allennnnnnnn~! Are you in here?" Lavi exclaimed, peeping his head through the door. He heard a groan. "Allen? Is that you?" he asked, walking in. Another groan. "Allen?" One of the stall doors opened with a bang.

"Yeah, it's me, Lavi. What do you want..." Allen drawled off, massaging his temples. The cake had also given him a killer migraine. Lavi stared at the young exorcist with wide eyes, mouth hanging open in shock. Allen glanced at the redhead and gave him a peculiar look. "What are you staring at...?" No response.

_Groannn_

'Aughhh!!! Not again!' Allen though, shuffling back to his former stall. As he walked past the sinks, he saw something that caught his eye. A short, white-haired female with a cute, but pained pout on her face. 'Ehh? Who's that? I thought only Lavi and I were the ones in the restroom. Besides, this is the MEN's restroom.'

He paused and stared at the face. She was short, maybe two inches taller than Allen himself was, with silvery-white hair that reached a bit past her shoulders. A pair of large, curious, grey eyes peered back at him, a red scar stretched vertically across the girl's left eye, forming an upside-down pentacle at the top then a strange, almost thunderbolt-like line on the lower portion of her face. From what Allen could see, her form looked thin and almost fragile even, as if the slightest movement would fracture and cause her to crumble away. Allen tilted his head, to his surprise the girl in the mirror did as well. He moved closer to the mirror and she did the same.

Okay, now Allen was really freaked out. He did a complete 360 around himself and found that no one besides him and Lavi (who, by the way, was still letting the flies in through his mouth) was in the restroom.

"What's going on here..." Allen asked outloud. He blinked in shock. Something sounded off about his voice. Was it...was it a little higher than usual?

"Kanda is an idiot." Allen said, affirming that his voice was indeed, a little bit higher. He tried coughing. Still the same. He hit his chest slightly. "Oww!" He stopped himself. Wait a minute. Why would that hurt? He patted his chest and found something...different about that as well. Was it just him, or did it seem a bit...puffed up or something?

A chilling feeling that something was severely off ran through Allen's spine. He stared at the girl again. The girl stared back.

The girl in the mirror, the dainty little flower that looked so weak and helpless...was him.

Allen felt his sanity and soul leave him, the two skipping off into the sunset hand in hand, while waving goodbye at a horrified Allen.

He rushed into one of the stalls.

A couple seconds passed.

"OH MY GOD, I'M A GIRL!!!!!!"

Lavi stood off in the same place where he had been standing the whole time. He hadn't moved an inch. But, if you looked closely you could see his soul seeping out from his open mouth. A tiny voice in his head said one word, and one word only.

'STRIKE!?'

* * *

A/N- Sighs. I'm not sure I captured Allen's character all that well. It's always those sweet polite guys that are a tad harder to write. Oh well. It's the eccentric mad scientists that are more fun to write about. KOMUIIIII~~ Your wacky tinkering is welcome anytime here. Just don't feed me any of those potions. -___-

Hehe, did any of you get why Allen went into the stall? Ima give you a hint...hotdogs. *gets shot* X__x

Mehh...Allen-kun you're so slow. But you're a girl now! And a pretty cute one too if Lavi's screechin' "Strike!" for you! (slight hint-hint, nudge-nudge, that sorta thing) ^__________^U Wonder what the other guys n girls are gonna think of you now. Do I detect a possible harem?? Ehh, that you will all have to wait and read later for. I haven't really planned everything out yet. This is one of my more "Let's wing it and see how far it goes!" fanfics. Not structured yet. But I'll work on that. :DD

_**Anyhooo~ If ya'll want another chapter, I want at least eight or more reviews. Not kidding here. -.-**_

Tell me what you all think, some suggestions/criticism, encouragement, that sorta thing.

**_REVIEW DAMMIT!! *brings Komurin X out* (yeah. be scared. be very scared. .)_**


	2. Chapter 2

A/N- I'M BACK PEOPLE~! Thought I'd gone up and died, didn't you. Well, rest assured, this fic is not abandoned and will be continued and I do hope I finish it. It'll be the first multiple chap fic I ever finish if I do.

Ohmygosh...you all are so amazing. *sob* I only wanted eight but instead i got TWENTY from you all. *sobs some more* ahem...ahh, i realize this update is LONG overdue. but i have some (crappy) excuses! *gets shot* okies..well, school obviously sucks A LOT of time away from me then there's some more personal crap that's not really all that interesting and then there's my lovely procrastination habit. :DD *shot* well, my algebra finals and school are over and hey, hey, i'm writing this chap to you all on my birthday! so yay for me, i'm fourteen. :P

**BEFORE YOU READ! Even though Allen's in chick form, he's still gonna be referred to as a he unless the person doesn't know it's Allen**. I know, confusing. =_=U

i have some more stuff to say but i'll save that for the other authoress' note. :)

anyways, thank you all so much for the reviews, it made me giddy with joy and happiness to see a review alert in my inbox. i loves you all~ *shot* that about sums up what i wanted to say (i had initially planned to reply to my eight reviews but twenty is too much for my lazy self :P) let's get the show on the road shall we?

this chapter has not been beta'd so forgive me if there are any mistakes, typo, et cetra. ^^;;

Disclaimer- do not own, never shall, because i lack the artistic talent and insane plotbunnies.

* * *

**Chapter Two**

**Girl of My Dreams**

Life isn't fair. Every person on Earth probably knew that. And if they didn't they were in a buttload of denial.

Allen had always been one to stay positive and think more on the bright side. After all, when in the occupation of killing and purifying forsaken souls in the form of horrific and demonic monstrosities under the employment of the world's greatest enemy (a fat old man with a weird smile and a liking to equally weird tophats), one could find themselves falling into bouts of depression here and there.

But, nonetheless, Allen was an optimist and looked for a silver lining in almost everything. A mission in a faraway country for three weeks- a chance to visit a exotic land and do some sightseeing. Coming down with a crippling cold and being bedridden for its entire duration- a chance to be lazy and sleep in, plus get some of Jerry's famous "Get well soon, desu!" soup. Kanda's out cold after eating a bowl of soba that had food poisoning in it- ...haha.

However this...this was hard to stay positive about.

Allen was in a changing room, wearing a frilly, pink skirt with a matching cute, flowery blouse.

"L-lenalee...how much longer do I have to keep trying on these clothes?" he asked nervously, trying to scratch his back. The thing that held his breasts in place, which Lenalee called a bra, and was starting to give him a rash. Allen heard a giggle from the other side of the door.

"A little while longer, Allen-chan, er, kun. We need to find you an appropriate outfit while Jerry-san makes you your new uniform." Allen sighed. He'd learned a lot of new things since his 'transformation'. One was that being a girl involved trying on lots and lots of clothes (that all made Allen feel uncomfortable and embarrassed when he was his reflection in the mirror) and being dissatisfied with all of them. Second was girls' undergarments and boys' undergarments were veryyyy different. And third was that he had learned that the maker of the Black Order uniforms was Jerry. The man(?) had a plethora of strange hobbies and pass times, fashion and design along with sewing were also in his repertoire.

Allen had offered to just wear his regular uniform (the one meant for males) instead and save Jerry the trouble. In response, Jerry had dramatically whipped around and blatantly whispered in a very scary way, 'no..'. Jerry had a black side too, whose blackness was comparable to Allen's own black side.

"Allen-kun, do you mind if I come in and see how the clothes look on you?" Lenalee asked hopefully. Allen opened the door and reluctantly stepped out.

"Aww, you look so cute~!" she gushed. Allen sweatdropped a little. Ever since he had first approached her and asked for her assistance with the more feminine things involved in being a member of the opposite sex, she had begun act a little like Jerry did when he first saw Allen's new appearance.

_Flashback_

_*knock* *knock*_

_"Who is it?" a bright-sounding voice said from inside the room. Allen fidgeted, anxiously crossing his arms a little tighter around his chest._

_"I-it's me, Allen." the door opened and Lenalee appeared in the doorway and a gentle breeze of sweet-smelling shampoo and soap wafted outside, her hair wrapped up in a slightly moist towel. _

_"Hi, Al-ahh...ah...erm, who are you and have we met before..?" Lenalee asked, confused over the image of the person standing in front of her. It wasn't Allen, that was for sure. It was a petite, white-haired female with shy, grey eyes. The only thing about her that resembled Allen was the pentacle-shaped scar on her left eye and the white hair. The girl shifted again and stared hard into the stone floor._

_"I-it's me, Lenalee. Allen, Allen Walker." Lenalee's mouth opened just slightly. Allen went on, eyes glued to the ground below him. "I ate this delicious cake that Jerry gave me and shortly after I found that my body's anatomy had...changed." a tiny blush appeared on her pale face._

_Lenalee still didn't understand the whole situation, but she could tell that the girl...or rather Allen, if she was telling the truth, was quite frazzled and jittery. She led him inside her room so that she could explain more in depth._

_XDXDXD_

_"- and that's how it all happened." Allen finished explaining. Lenalee nodded, trying to put all the pieces of the puzzle together. She was still a little hazy on some parts but she understood the facts._

_-Allen was now (or temporarily) a member of the opposite gender._

_-Komui somehow had had a hand in all of this._

_-And finally, that Allen made one heck of a cute little girl!_

_End Flashback_

Afterwards, the two had gone to confront Komui and upon seeing him, Allen promptly beat the shit out of the guy. On any other occasion, Lenalee would have held Allen back, but she had to admit that her crazy, over-protective older brother had gone too far this time. Allen needed to get some time to vent, even if venting included using Crown Clown to tie Komui up to the ceiling and then proceed to smack him around from below with his Sword of Exorcism, much like a hungry fat kid whacking a piñata full of chocolate or an angry housewife whacking their bum of a husband.

So Lenalee just stood back and gave her Nii-san a pained smile and watched. Komui tried tears of betrayal and sobbed throughout it all.

Allen had enjoyed his retribution on Komui, but he'd still rather the man fix him up a antidote lickity-split and get him back to normal. Unfortunately, that had slipped his mind and before he could force an antidote out of him, Komui ended up unconscious and in critical condition with a water bag dripping glucose into him. The doctors said he would most likely stay that way for a week and a half. What was more, Komui didn't keep track of all the ingredients he put into each of his concoctions, so the scientist would have to search for the components he had used and then find something that would cancel out its affects. That process itself would take a bare minimum of three weeks.

Thus, Allen approximated that he would be stuck in his condition for at least a month.

Meaning that he would have to learn to adjust to his new body and learn the 'ropes' of being a girl, as Lenalee had put it and kindly offered to help him out with. Allen had agreed, thinking that these 'ropes' would make his life for the time being easier. But, so far all they had done was rush over to Jerry, order a new uniform to be made for Allen, then sneak out of headquarters to go into town and scour several department stores for clothes for Allen to wear.

Lenalee had made Allen try on dresses (this included casual dresses, formal dresses, sundresses, etc.), blouses/shirts (frilly, dressy, silk, etc.), pants of all kinds, and skirts. Oh, how he dreaded those tiny things that scantily covered only the upper half of his thighs. They made him feel as though he was only clad in boxers and walking around in them made his legs cold. How did girls manage to wear such gaudy articles of clothing?

That, Allen considered to be the million-dollar question. Alongside how to get himself back to normal, of course.

"Ah! Allen, I already picked out clothes in the beginning, but I wondered what you would look like in all those other things so..." Lenalee drawled off, not bothering to finish her sentence upon seeing Allen's exasperated and tired expression. "Well, I'll be at the cashier's, don't worry it's all on me. I'll see you in a bit." and with that the cheery girl dissipated into the crowds of shoppers.

Allen buried his head in the mounds of clothes around him and screamed into them. All of that work...all of that changing...embarrassment...and that dressing in drag (Allen's mindset was that underneath all the female parts, he was still a guy...)...for nothing. He sighed for probably the fiftieth time that day and got up and went in search of Lenaleeand his new set of girly garbs.

_Earlier That Day, Black Order HQ_

"That damn usagi and moyashi...where did those idiots run off to?" Kanda muttered as he walked through the silent corridor, his strides long and steady. He hadn't seen the two since Lavi had tackled him out of nowhere then vanished to find the moyashi's whearabouts. Without them the whole headquarters seemed to be ten-times more had also gone missing as well and that struck him as strange. Lenalee was like an friendly bowl of soba, always nearby.

Plus, Allen had missed his first, second, and third afternoon snack. That meant the beansprout was either knocked out cold or dead. It really didn't matter to Kanda whichever one of the two it was, but their absence was starting to make a tiny knot in his stomach.

Some people would call what Kanda was experiencing 'worry', but those people would be dead wrong. He was just pissed off with the silence is all.

He rounded the next corner and finally came to his destination, the boys' restroom.

Kanda kicked the door open and walked in, giving the room a once-over, his black eyes narrowed with twice the usual scrutiny. He nearly missed the strange statue in the middle of the room. Was that there the last time?

"What the hell is this?" Kanda asked to no one in particular. He marched over to the figure and looked at it. His eyes widened a bit in surprise. "Lavi? Why the hell is this moron still in here?" He poked the stock-still Junior Bookman, no response. "Hn."

Kanda smacked the man across the face a couple times (maybe a few more than necessary, but that was just for his entertainment) and still nothing. The guy was out cold. Strangest thing of all was the expression on the redhead's face. His eyes were widened to nearly twice their size and if one looked closely enough there were little, itty-bitty pink hearts below his pupils. His mouth was slack and open, the ends of it turned up the tiniest bit in a smile and a thin line of drool coming from the corner. Finally his cheeks were faintly brushed with the color pink.

What the fuck had the guy been looking at, nonetheless in the guys' bathroom?

Ehh. Kanda had decided that he'd rather not know. Well, time to get the idiot back to his room. He'd probably scared a number of exorcists and finders alike out of the room with his pseudo-death trance state. Kanda grabbed Lavi by the bandanna and dragged him out of his room and to Lavi's room, where he had pushed Lavi in face first to his mattress then left.

_Regular Time, Black Order HQ_

Allen stared at his reflection in the mirror and groaned. He had gotten used to seeing a female instead of a male on the reflective surface, but whenever he saw his new self, Allen was usually dressed quite differently. Up until now, Allen worn a baggy white dress shirt, black pants, and a pair of boots. But, currently, Allen was wearing an outfit comprised of the clothes Lenalee had chosen for him from their ghastly shopping trip.

He wore a purple and black turtleneck sweater with sleeves that halfway covered his fingers, a slightly poofy black skirt, and the same pair of boots. Allen was glad that Lenaleehadn't picked randomly bright and colorful clothes and stuck to more darker colors, because heaven help him if anyone saw Allen prancing about in an orange tank top and and neon green short-shorts.

Lenalee had enforced the rule that before any ensemble could be complete, a few accessories were needed. And so, after much resistance from Allen, Lenalee managed to get a silver chain with a silver bell tied to the chain with a white ribbon. (What was he, a cow?) She had also fiddled with his hair and clipped his bangs back with three bobby pins, one of the left side an two on the right). Keeping with the silver trend, there were four plain, silver bangles on the sleeve of her right hand.

"I look like such a...girl." he said. Lenalee comforted the boy, placing her hands on his thin shoulders, which, unfortunately, didn't provide much assurance.

"You look fine. Really pretty, in fact." she complemented. Allen sweatdropped, he really didn't want to be described as pretty. Yet another blow to his quickly diminishing pride.

"Thanks, I guess." Realizing that her words had unintentionally made Allen feel worse, Lenalee apologized.

"Sorry, I wasn't thinking. But chin up, it's not forever." Allen sighed and nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, I guess it could be worse.." Allen felt his stomach groan in discomfort as it let out and audible growl, he hadn't eaten anything since the cake and that was around one in the afternoon. Now it was...he looked at a nearby clock, quarter til' seven. Lenalee smiled.

"Wanna get something to eat?" he nodded and the two girls left the room.

_Lavi's Room_

Lavi squirmed distress on his bed. Whatever he was dreaming about was obviously causing him out.

"Ahh...ahh...AHH!" Lavi yelled, bolting up on his mattress. He looked around. Where was he? The room he was in had three bookcases, books crammed tightly into each of them. On the floor there were a couple of clothes and more books lying around. In the corner of the room was a desk and chair, the desk was messy with papers and pens. The whole room was dimly lit and the clock on his disaster area of a desk read 6:45 PM.

He scratched the back of his head as he stifled a yawn and got off the bed to stretch. Had he really slept that long? So that meant that bizarre dream that he had was really just a dream? Huh. It had all seemed so real. He had gone into the mens' restroom to search for Allen and for some reason a super cute girl dressed in Allen's clothes had walked out of one of the stalls to greet him. (albeit, annoyingly, but, boy, was she hot)

Near the end, the pleasant dream had taken a turn for the worst and transposed into a scary nightmare where a long-haired demon began smacking him about the face then dragged him away into its cave. Lavi shivered at the memory.

One a lighter note, for some crazy reason, Lavi had actually thought that the girl in his dream was Allen, but it couldn't possibly be him. She had breasts and a cute perky butt. Still it was kinda unusual that she had the same scar and white hair that Allen had...

Lavi shook his head, deciding that a dream wasn't something that usually made sense and that it was best to not try and understand it. Besides, it was time for dinner and where there was food, there was Allen. He could tell him about his dream then have some good laughs about it.

_Cafeteria_

*munch* *slurp* *chomp* *etc.*

Plate after plate, he consumed them all, stopping only for the occasional drink of water. Again, Lenalee was quiet and simply watched, except this time her friend was gorging on food instead of injuring her older brother.

Ramen noodles, pork buns, fried rice, jambalaya, creme brulee, cheeseburgers. The list went on.

Lenalee sometimes wondered how all that food could fit in one little guy. She knew that the reason why Allen ate so much was because of his parasitic-type innocence, but still. She was a bit jealous that the boy could eat all that and still stay so thin. However, that just meant that he would get to miss out on one aspect of a girl's life- weight watching. She really couldn't picture Allen on a diet.

"You sure you don't want any?" Allen asked through a bite of blueberry pie, however with the food in his mouth, it sounded more like Morse code only with 'mmphs'. Lenalee shook her head.

"No, I'm fine." Allen nodded and continued eating until he finished off what was left on his tray. 'Time to get more food!' he thought cheerfully and he picked up his mess and stacked it neatly onto the tray and put it into the dish washing line. 'Hmm..that chocolate cake looks good!' And with that he took the cake and put it onto a fresh tray and bounded off back to his seat.

*bam*

He ran into someone and squashed the cake into the person's shirt. 'Shit, how could I be so clumsy...'

"I-i'm so sorry!" Allen squeaked. The person chuckled.

"Oh, it's fine. Accidents happen, besides, I was thinking this shirt needed something." Allen exhaled in relief, at least this person had a sense of humor about things. He looked up at the man she'd bumped into and smiled.

"R-right. Thanks, mis-...Lavi?" he blinked. The person she had run into was Lavi? That made sense, he guessed. Lavi was a good sport about practically everything and the red hair, bandanna, and eye patch told it all. It was Lavi alright. "Sorry about that, Lavi. I wasn't watching where I was going. ...Lavi?"

Something was wrong with the redhead. Lavi was frozen on the spot and his eyes were widened. It reminded Allen a lot like how he had reacted upon seeing Allen back in the restroom. He waved a hand in front of his face.

"Hey, you there?"

XDXDXD

Lavi couldn't believe it. There she was. The girl he'd met in his dream. She was right in front of him. So she was real! This had to be fate, I mean, first he encountered her in his dreams, now she was standing right there. Might as well have been planned by a soppy romantic movie director.

"Hey, you there?" she asked. He blinked. What the heck was he doing? Staring off into space while the girl in his dreams (literally, she was the girl from his dreams) was here and trying to talk to him. Make a move, for Pete's sake! Lavi shook his head and smiled.

"Ahh, yes, yes, I'm fine. Sorry about that. Kinda, uh...zoned out." She scoffed and gave a small smile.

"Typical of you, Lavi." HOLY SHIT. She knew his name too? Is this girl heaven-sent or something? Now he wouldn't have to think of a corny/clever way to introduce himself. But wait, if she already knew his name that meant that they must have met before? Other than in his dream, of course. In his mind, he put a thinking face on.

Had he forgotten her? Impossible. She was too hot to forget about. Plus, something about her made her seem like, I don't know, 'one of the guys'? Weird. 'Ah, quick, Lavi! Remember her name! Scour that extensive memory for her name!' he thought to himself. Argh, nada. Dammit, she seemed so familiar too..

"Hm? Something wrong?" she asked, her brow crinkled in confusion. Aww. Cute. Damn, nothing came to mind. Should he risk it by asking for her name again? Well, it wasn't as though he had another choice.

"Oh, no..everything's fine. But, um, have we met before..?" he drawled off. She rose a brow in disbelief. Oh crap. Wrong move.

"Uh, yeah, Lavi. We have met before. We've known each other for a while now.." We have? Alright, what the hell was going on? Something felt severely off right now. Just who was this girl?

"R-really? So, uh, what's your name again?" Lavi asked with failed discreetness.

XDXDXD

'What's wrong with Lavi?' Allen thought. He would understand Lavi's confusion if he hadn't seen his new 'appearance', but Lavi had been to the first to see it. Even before Allen himself had noticed it. He found it hard to believe that a person could forget seeing the female-version of an acquaintance of theirs.

Allen crossed his arms across his chest. (Really those breasts were starting to get annoying...) and asked Lavi, "Who do _you_ think I am?"

Lavi tilted his head a bit and his lips curved into a charming smile.

"The girl from my dreams." he deadpanned.

...what? What? WHAT?

T-the g-g-girl from his DREAMS?

What sort of crazy talk was this guy spouting? Had all that reading finally gone to his head and made him a lune? Or had he taken one too many swigs from Master's secret booze stash? (Perhaps he had been wrong to share that kind of information with Lavi...)

"L-lavi, it's me..Al-oof!" out of nowhere, Timcampy came down and landed on Allen's face. 'Well, at least someone recognizes me..' he thought. "Hey there, Timcampy.." he patted the golem's gold head.

"Allen!" Lenalee ran over "Sorry, it's my fault that Timcampy landed on your- oh, hi, Lavi. Where have you been?" Lenalee asked. Lavi was silent.

XDXDXD

_Inner Workings of Lavi's Brain_

_Reasoning/Understanding/Decisions/Thinking Division_

_Conference In Session_

*chatter* *chatter* *chatter*

"Okay, everyone, calm down. Alright, Lavi's, time to report. What do we know about this-" the screen behind the multiple Lavi's showed a picture of a girl with white hair, gray eyes, and a red pentacle scar. "-girl. Yes, you, Lavi No. 182." The head Lavi said. Lavi No. 182 stood up from his chair.

"We've recently had a dream about her and now we've met her in real life." he reported. The head Lavi nodded and wrote on the dry-erase board beside him.

"Got it. Next. Lavi No. 49."

"She says we've met before in real life, but reports from the Memory Division suggest otherwise." the head Lavi wrote that as well on the board.

"Lavi No. 415. What have you got?" Lavi No. 415 straightened his papers and coughed.

"Right. I have three things. One, Timcampy knows this girl. Two, Lenalee called her 'Allen'. Three, this girl bears resemblance to Allen Walker, a fellow exorcist and close friend. In conclusion, this leads me to believe that this girl-" he pointed at the screen. "-is...Allen Walker." A wave of whispers spread throughout the room.

The head Lavi nodded and scribed what Lavi No. 415 had said onto the board.

"Impressive. Good job, Lavi No. 415. Anyone else? Okay, well that concludes the reasoning and thinking. Time to put it all together. Any thoughts, fellow Lavi's?" the room was silent, a single hand rose up in the air. "Ah, yes. Lavi No. 771."

"Well, sir. If all the information we've gathered is correct, then the only conclusion that makes sense is Lavi No. 415's." another Lavi stood up and spoke out.

"If that's true then how is it that Allen Walker is a girl now?" The head Lavi slammed a gavel down.

"Hey! Lavi No. 18! No speaking out of turn. Although you do make a valid point. Got any comments, Lavi No. 771?" Lavi No. 771 nodded.

"Yessir. It means that the dream wasn't just a dream. It was real." With that statement the room exploded with talk.

XDXDXD

_Back to Real Life (note- no time has passed since the 'Lavi Conference')_

"A-Allen?" Lavi choked out. 'Oh, say it ain't so...' he thought numbly.

"Yeah?" The girl said. "So, you finally remembered who I am..." Well, that proves it. The girl of his dreams was Allen Walker. And with that, Lavi passed out. "L-Lavi!"

"Is he okay?" Lenalee gasped, bending down to check up on her fallen friend.

"I-I don't know." Allen said, doing the same and poking Lavi's cheek.

*snore*

Both Lenalee and Allen sweatdropped.

Lavi was fine, he just passed out and was sleeping now.

"Oi! Baka-usagi! Lenalee! Where have you been?" Kanda snapped, walking towards them with bowl of soba. Allen blinked. Kanda glared at her. "Who the hell are you?" Allen frowned.

"Bakanda."

"...!"

* * *

A/N- Holy crap. That must be a new world record for me. The whole chapter took me two days to type. Well, technically two and half. It's a little past one in the morning right now. But yayy! It's finished! (=w=)b *feels accomplished* Hope you all found it to your liking. It's not crazy long like with my Bleach fics but those are usually oneshots so yeahh. XPP (plus it's kinda hard to continuously keep coming up with this kinda crack. XDD)

Okies! Time for those things I had to say but waited until now to say. First off- **Guys, I need your help. Remember how I said I was gonna make this a Allen harem? Well, I'm still planning on doing that. But I want to know who you, the collective minds of the reader, would like to see included in that harem. I don't want it to be crazy, insanely huge. But, around 5-7. Maybe less if I lack the inspiration. :PP **(it's in bold. that means it's super-duper important ToT)

SO! Drop me a review. Tell me who you want, if you've got some idea on how the romance between Allen and your person would work out then tell me that too! I wanna make it one hell of a kickass harem for both me to write and for you all to read.

But, of course, I have boundaries of the harem-y stuff. *gets rotten tomato'd* -_-;; I don't do yuri. So no Lenalee/Allen, Miranda/Allen, Road/Allen, etc. (besides, i've got some more interesting roles of those characters ;D) Don't make the harem too out of the ballpark. For example, Tiedoll/Allen. That one is a no. Not saying that they have to be canon pairings but just not too crazy. O.o (can you imagine an Allen/Tiedoll romance? that's right. no, no you can't)

Second- I FRIGGIN' SWEAR TO BE BETTER WITH UPDATES! I truly, honestly, do! I had a lotta stuff going on. I just hope that you all haven't been turned off by now. (because I'm the type to just give up on a story if i don't get enough encouragement...encouragement=reviews) So please, bare with me...;AAAAAAAAA; I loves you allllllll

Third- Around the later chaps, I'm gonna start a poll-thing (if i can figure out how to work it) for you all to decide WHO Allen should ultimately fall for. Lavi, Kanda, etc.

Finally, Fourth- 'kay, listen up peoples! I you're allowed on adultfanfiction dot net then help my fellow authoress, Moonlight, out and read her story. (no, it's not me. i swear) It's a more "mature" version of this ficcie. It just uses the first chapter of my story so yeah. ^^ Plus I've read the second chapter and approved it, so you know it's some decent stuff. So if you want some more "action", go look it up.

That about wraps it up. Thanks everyone. :DDDDD

**Time to up the ante! Ten reviews or more, people. At least ten more! (am I a jackass for asking for more reviews than probably deserve? yes! yes, i am!) but seriously, 10+ Reviews PLEASEEEEE! ;AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA; *brings Bakanda out* and I'll throw in a free bishie with every meal! ;DD (bakanda ish so tasty...*_*)**


	3. Chapter 3

A/N- =_=U omg. seriously people, getting the number of reviews i requested in less than twenty-four hours from when the thing was updated is crazy. but...I LOVE YOU FOR IT! 8DDDDDD *huggles every single reviewer and gives them a free recyclable bishie *(we are a green bishie company -w-) you all helped to kick my inner-fangirl/author/crazy into gear. and for that, i present thee chapter three of TGBI. (annotations are ftw ;3)

okies. being silent for a for a while isn't as bad as being MIA for three months, right? *hopeful look* *get tomato'd* T^T anyways, i apologize. but my imagination is kinda runny these days when it comes to dgm, it's even scarcer. hoshino-sama isn't releasing any new chapters and it's crippling my authoress-ness. i tried to get some inspirations from doujins but...-man doujins are weird. lavi/allen is abundant but kanda/allen is un-abundant. for some reason kanda has gone uke in almost all of those. (not that that's a bad thing. my heart aches for a smexy allen-kun on top =w=) so yeah. :/

**minor note- story takes place a little bit before Wisely awakens**

you all seem to want (demand) to know what kanda thinks of allen so half the chapter is dedicated to that. and there may or may not be moments of kanda/allen. ._. and some other stuff.

ack. that's enough of my ranting for now. let's get 'er done! *shot* (i apologize..) more of my crap-rant will be heard at the end and i'll be answering a few of your questions, so stay tuned i guess? ^^;;

enjoy, loves.

Disclaimer- *sob* hoshino-chama come back...sniff. cobalt doesn't own anything.

* * *

**Chapter Three**

**Misunderstanding**

The air in the room hung stagnant. The previous chatter of the people around the group seemed to have realized some big was going on and immediately quieted. They also chose to watch from a safer location. A location one meter away, to be exact.

Thus, the four exorcists and one pet golem were surrounded by an audience of curious onlookers. They had nowhere to run and something epic seemed about to ensue. And when it came to Allen and Kanda, just that occurred.

A blanket of suspense covered the room wholesomely. Everyone, including Lenalee, (who was still down on the ground tending to a slumbering Lavi), looked on at Kanda, eager to hear his response. Even Allen was a bit apprehensive to hear what he had to say...or do. What if he made fun of him? What if he laughed? What if he got knocked out cold like Lavi? Endless scenarios were playing themselves out in Allen's mind.

Finally, Kanda spoke.

"Wow." Allen blinked and restrained himself from stupidly saying "what?". Kanda went on, lifting an arm to nervously scratch at back of his head. "I didn't know you were into...that kinda stuff..."

...

...

...THE HELL? What does he mean by "that kinda stuff"? What stuff was there to be into? It's not like he was dressing this way because he wanted to, because that would make him a...oh my God.

Did Kanda actually think he was a...*gulp* transvestite?

Oh no, oh no, oh no, OH NOOOOO!

Allen Walker was many things, an exorcist- sure, a big eater- you betcha, the prophesized 'Destroyer of Time'- if the shoe fits. But! A tranny, he was not. And damn that stupid Bakanda for thinking he was one! Because...well...he's not! Just because he's in...girl's clothes...doesn't mean he likes wearing that kinda crap!

Anyways, even if he continued to wear his regular (male) clothes, by default that would make him a tranny. Him being a _girl_ and all...

He had to set the record straight. Allen couldn't have Kanda going about thinking he was a transvestite. That was just...not right.

Speaking of which, where was that guy? Allen's eyes searched for a grumpy head with a ponytail on it but found no such noggin. Dammit, he must have disappeared into crowd (to get some soba if his hunch was correct) while Allen was drifting off panicking in his mind.

Allen felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Allen-kun." Allen spun around, surprised. Oh, it was just Lenalee. He had forgotten she was still here. He looked down beside her, Lavi was still asleep. Thank heavens for that too. If Lavi heard Kanda thought he was a transvestite, he'd never hear the end of it. "Allen? You there?" Lenalee waved her hand across his face.

"Y-yeah, yeah..I'm fine. Just a little weirded out." Lenalee nodded.

"That's understandable. It's okay. Kanda's just...Kanda." she comforted, however finding no words to explain Kanda's...'speculation' that wouldn't further hurt Allen's self-esteem.

Another awkward silence set itself off upon the group (rather it was just two girls and a guy asleep on the floor, but nonetheless..). Lenalee coughed, breaking the pregnant pause.

"Uhm, Allen? Could you help me get Lavi back to his room? He's start to slobber on the floor.." Allen frowned, seeing a tiny puddle of drool starting to form from Lavi's gaping mouth.

"Sure. I'll get the head, you take the feet." With a nod from Lenalee, the two began to lift the sleeping redhead and carried him off to his room.

XDXDXD

_Allen's Room_

"Oh...Timcampy...am I really that weird-looking?" Allen muttered to his winged pet, lying face-first on his now messy bed. The golem shrugged its wings. Golems didn't care much about the appearances of their masters. Pretty or ugly, male or female, it didn't matter to Timcampy as long as it was kept fed.

Allen groaned. "Thanks for the reassurance, Tim. Aw, dammit...what if Kanda's not the only one that thinks I'm into crossdressing. I mean, it's not like I care horribly too much of what they all think of me, but I certainly don't want them thinking of me as a transvestite. Dammit, what do I do?" Again, Timcampy shrugged, causing Allen to bury his face further into his pillow.

"I'll just stay in my room until Komui comes to and starts working on that antidote." Timcampy flapped its wings once, which translated into "What about food?". Allen cursed. "Ugh. Forgot about that."

XDXDXD

The Black Order HQ had an abundance of empty or unused rooms, and although everyone was advised not to use them for their own personal needs, people did. In fact, within the 'stupidly silent' stone walls of the Black Order (as Komui put it), were a variety of rooms dedicated to variety of activities.

There were rooms dedicated to indoor sports, outdoor sports, clubs of all kind (from book clubs to funky name clubs), Dungeons and Dragons, card games (Allen thinks it's unfair that he was eternally banned from there after just one match, but his opponents at the time digress), trade/haggling, etc. And as long as there was no "ratting them out to man", everyone was welcome to come in and use the rooms as they pleased.

Even Kanda founded his own room, a room dedicated for meditation and solitude. In other words, a room for Kanda to calm himself down before he hacked anyone in half who pissed him off.

But only an exclusive few were allowed in said room. Kanda, being the founder, Lenalee, Noise, and very rarely, Allen. Lavi and Komui were forbidden from entering.

Right now, Kanda was the only one in the room and was deep into mediation, his mind recently scarred with the knowledge of Allen's new pass time.

'I knew the beansprout was a bit more feminine looking than most, but that was just...*shudders*...' Kanda thought while he exhaled. The meditation session was taking a great deal long than it usually did but that was because for once, Kanda was deeply conflicted.

It was a known fact that Kanda was very blunt and didn't put much thought into his actions, or so he made it seem. He had always been a "kick ass first, talk later" type of guy and didn't stay lost in thought for long.

However, upon seeing Allen's...new outfit, he'd been thinking a lot since that event and found that he had mixed feelings about it. On one hand, Kanda thought that the act of crossdressing (especially a male crossdresser) was creepy and disgusting (depending on the extent he/she took it to). Now on the other hand, Kanda didn't find Allen crossdressing _that _creepy and disgusting. Strange, because Allen really, really seemed to have put a lot of effort into his new appearance. I mean, he had a frickin' bust, for Christ's sake (The thought of which made his face two degrees warmer). It all really didn't bother Kanda that much after getting past the initial shock that one of his annoying friend-like-person was a tranny.

And to be honest, Allen didn't make such a hideous girl. Actually, it looked kind of natural. Maybe even pretty. Reminded him a bit of Lenalee, although Allen clearly lacked the grace of a real girl.

_Click_

A small draft of cool air entered the room, signaling someone was there. Kanda paid no notice. Most likely the unexpected guest was Lenalee, she liked to join in his meditation sessions occasionally.

"Kanda." the voice said tartly. It was Lenalee's voice, no doubt about it. He opened one eye and peered up at the figure.

"Wha-ow!" Only to be rudely interrupted by the smack of a broom on the side of his head. He fell over on the straw-mat floor, his lotus position completely toppled over. Kanda glared up at her. "What the hell was that for?"

Lenalee hmph'ed and tightly held the broom upright in one hand while fiercely staring down Kanda's meager glare, looking much the part of a fearsome warrior or perhaps a scorned housewife. Which was scarier, Kanda did not know.

"For being such a stupid idiot, that's why." she said. Kanda rubbed the side of his head that had been brutally assaulted.

"Why? What'd I do?" Lenalee's stare narrowed a fraction and she raised the broom to smack him again. Kanda backed away a bit, waiting for the incoming attack, but surprisingly there was none. Lenalee's angry gaze faltered for a second and with an irritated click of her tongue, she lowered the broom back down. Kanda was confused but a tad relieved, he had a feeling that the next one really would have hurt.

Lenalee sighed, then looked down at him again. "Why'd you say that to Allen?"

Kanda drew a blank. "Huh?"

She sighed again, this time as though she were a mother scolding a child who didn't know what he did wrong. "'Wow, I didn't know you were into that kinda stuff.' What the hell, Kanda? I know you two don't really get along but that's not something you should say. Not with Allen going this...time." Kanda turned his head off to the side defiantly.

"I didn't say it like that. I just wasn't expecting to see that. And by how you said that last part, you agree it's weird too."

"Well, of course, I agree it's weird. And besides, Komui-nii is the one to blame for it, not Allen. So I don't see why you had to be so rude and-"

"Wait, Komui's the reason why Allen is how he is?" Kanda asked, shocked. Just what did that man do to the poor kid? Brainwash him? Lenalee nodded, not quite sure where the conversation was headed. "So...does he do it too?" Lenalee frowned. 'Huh? Does he mean try out his own potions? If so, no, never. He always has others try it out for him. ...I have to remember to scold him about that.'

"No, he just has others do it for him." Kanda looked disgusted. 'That sick perv! What the hell is wrong with him? ...Well, okay, a lot. But just how many screws are loose in that guy's head?'

"Kanda? Are you okay? You look like you're about to be sick..." Lenalee asked worriedly, immediately regretting smacking him with the broom earlier. Kanda shook his head.

"No..I'm fine." Lenalee doubted that, but decided to move onto a different topic.

"Anyways, you should go apologize to Allen. You kind of...hurt his feelings when you said that. Now he's in his room all...glum." Kanda stared at her in mild disbelief.

"What did you say?"

"Glum?"

"No, not that. That I 'hurt his feelings'. That doesn't sound like Allen."

"You're right. But, he's a girl now and the estrogen's probably kicking in now.." she stopped, seeing that Kanda was staring at her as though she's sprouted a second head. She sighed. "Look, it's the medical term and I thought you'd be more ma-" Kanda interrupted her.

"Lenalee...you know Allen's not _really_ a girl." Lenalee frowned again.

"Yes, he is." Kanda blinked, surprised that Lenalee believed the new Allen to that extent.

"Lenalee, even though he dresses like a girl that doesn't really make him a girl. You understand?" This time it was Lenalee's turn to blink. Seeming realizing something, Lenalee took a small sharp intake of air.

"Oh my god. Kanda?"

"Hm?"

"Just what do you think Allen is?" she asked slowly.

"A transvestite." he said, almost as if stating the sky was blue. Lenalee closed her eyes and shook her head.

"Kanda?" she said, clearly exasperated with their entire chat.

"Hm?"

With a speed comparable to that of light, the broom again made impact with the side of Kanda's head.

"YOU'RE A STUPID IDIOT!"

XDXDXD

Lenalee exited the room, having giving Kanda a concussion and thoroughly explaining to him that no, Allen was not a transvestite and that he had taken a messed up concoction made by Komui that turned him into a girl. In retort Kanda had yelled, "Well how the hell was I supposed to know that?"

Lenalee shook her head in disbelief. How could Kanda jump to conclusions like that? Then again, the actual reason why Allen was a girl was a bit far-fetched as well.

"I better tell Lavi and the others too just in case they misunderstand as well..."

XDXDXD

_Allen's Room_

_Zzz... _

Allen softly snored as he slept, he'd been up for the past hours trying to think of how to confront his problem but in the end had come up with nothing. All the worrying and thinking took a lot of his energy and seeing as how he had skipped dinner (because of his little run-in with both Kanda and Lavi), it wasn't long before the weariness got to him and he fell asleep.

Frankly, Timcampy was relieved that his master (or was it mistress now? No, scratch that. Mistress just sounded inappropriate...) finally stopped his worrying. If it was possible to grow warts from too much worry then why didn't his master look like a toad yet? Human expressions were so misleading.

The winged-golem swallowed another cookie from a jar hidden behind a row of books that Timcampy doubted Allen ever even read, much less opened. He's wasn't exacting the intellectual type, being raised by a clown and then a psychotic ladies' man.

...Yes, his master kept a secret jar filled with chocolate chip cookies hidden in his bookcase. Allen didn't think that anyone knew of his cookie jar, but Timcampy liked to poke around Allen's stuff when he's not there.

"Dammit...stupid Bakanda...argh...Lavi you...all your fault...Komui..." Allen muttered into his pillow. Timcampy sighed. His master had a problem with talking in his sleep and because he wasn't conscious of what he was saying, sometimes it landed him in big trouble. One time, Allen had been asleep and had called Cross a bunch of names that landed him stranded on a cargo ship for two weeks, courtesy of Cross. Or as Allen had said, the lazy, no-good pervert.

"...Mana...no..." If golems could frown, Timcampy would at that moment. Allen's dreams were erratic and ever-changing. One moment they would be happy and carefree the next horrible and apocalyptic. When Mana came into play, Allen's dreams would turn into nightmares that seemed to last forever.

Timcampy flew over to Allen and pulled the covers over his small frame before curling up beside him to wait the storm of memories out with its master.

XDXDXD

_Allen's Dream_

Recently this had been happening more often since Allen learned he carried the memories of the 14th within him, one moment Allen would be dreaming about whatever was on his mind then the next he'd find himself in a white room sitting across a table from a shadowy figure.

This time Allen seemed to have been pulled into the room while during a teatime of sorts. Two cups, two plates, a tea pot, and an assortment of sweets were set out across the table.

"Oh, you're early. You must have something on your mind. By the way, I like the new look." The person said, a smile evident in its voice. Allen simply glared. In his encounters with the 14th, he lost the ability to speak and could only use a select amount of gestures. Glaring, one of them.

"Nothing you want to talk about? That's a shame. Anyways, I wouldn't bring you here unless I had something to tell you, so listen up. The Black Order has probably already noticed, but the Earl has been much quieter than usual and knowing that fat old man, he's planning something big. And when the Noahs make their move, you'd better be ready for it. I would hate to have my host die on me before I can wake up." Allen blinked, the 14th never warned Allen about anything before, usually the 14th would call him there to antagonize him about his plans to take over Allen's body.

"Well, I must bid you adieu, my cute little Musician. Until next time." Allen blinked again and the room was gone, instead he was sitting beside Mana's grave with the Millennium Earl gazing down above on him.

"Konbanwa, Allen-kun~"

XDXDXD

Allen woke up to the darkened ceiling of his room. He sat up and stretched then got out of bed. Hm, he hadn't changed before he fell asleep and now his new clothes were all frumpy.

"I should change..." Allen muttered, opening a dresser drawer.

_Groan.._

"Then get something to eat." Allen decided, pulling out a large t-shirt and shorts.

XDXDXD

"Food, food, food, food," Allen quietly chanted as he rummaged through the cafeteria's extra large refrigerator filled with leftovers of Jerry's wondrous cooking. He took a slightly untouched deli platter, half a brisket, two cheeseburgers, and a jug of milk. Allen later found a cookie jar atop the kitchen appliance. Ha, Jerry really needed to hide his cookie jar better, Allen's own cookie jar had never been found by any man or woman.

Allen was working his way through the last cheeseburger when the light in the cafeteria kitchen was turned on. Ohh...Jerry was going to have a fit. He didn't know that it was Allen ransacking his kitchen of its food, he just thought it was rats. Really, really big rats that ate insane amounts of food.

"Moyashi? What are you doing?" Kanda. That's not good, but it's better than an angry Jerry with a handful of mousetraps.

"Eating." Allen said, his mouth chewing the last piece of cheeseburger. "You?"

"I got hungry as well. So I'm here to see if there's any soba leftover." Allen rolled his eyes.

"Of course."

Minutes later, Kanda was eating soba on the table while Allen ate a peanut butter cookie. No conversations were taking place, only the eating of unauthorized food.

Kanda stopped and placed his chopsticks down. Allen arched a brow. Kanda didn't stop eating his soba for anything.

"Oi, moyashi. I heard about...the cake thing." Allen grunted.

"Mm, did you now. Explaining why I would be into 'that kinda stuff'. ...And my name is Allen, get it right." Kanda sighed.

"Look...I jumped to conclusions and I said something stupid. So...'m s'rry." Kanda muttered. Allen blinked. Did Kanda just...? Ohh, this was moment to savor and exploit. Allen's (much pinker) lips curled into a smirk.

"What'd ya say~? I didn't quite catch that~" Kanda sighed.

"I said 'm s'rry.."

"Whattt?" Allen asked again, clearly enjoying himself.

"'M s'rry!"

"Whattt?"

"I SAID I'M SORRY DAMMIT!" Kanda barked. Allen looked smug.

"It's okay, I forgive your stupidity." he said cheekily. Kanda groaned. 'Damn moyashi...'

"Uh, well if it helps. You're not that ugly for a girl who used to be a guy." Allen sweatdropped. Kanda's attempts at trying to say something nice usually came out more as insults.

"So I've heard." Allen said, biting into another cookie. Kanda looked bemused. "Lavi called me the girl of his dreams." Kanda grunted.

"Lavi's a dumbass." Allen laughed quietly.

"Noted. But it was just misunderstanding...I think." Kanda nodded then returned to eating his soba.

XDXDXD

'Ugh...this is weird.' Kanda thought. He'd finally done what Lenalee told him to do and apologized. But the damn beansprout didn't seem to have 'hurt feelings' over what he had said. Lenalee had probably over exaggerated. Or the beansprout had gotten over it.

The familiar silence returned and filled the kitchen with its mute awkwardness.

'Dammit this is going nowhere..' Kanda glanced over at Allen. 'Hm..besides his hair being a bit longer, there doesn't seem to be that much of a difference. Ah, I'm full..' Kanda got up and put away the rest of the remaining soba but as he was turning around to leave the room, he found himself staring at Allen's backside.

Which wouldn't be a problem except for some godforsaken reason, Allen was standing up and eating instead of sitting down (like a normal person). And that gave Kanda a very detailed view of well...Allen's new self (from the back). Which was to say, VERY different from the old Allen.

From the back, Allen's female self had small, thin frame with soft, supple curves and shiny silvery-white hair that almost reached halfway down Allen's back. His height hadn't changed much and was maybe an inch or two taller, but for some reason, Allen's legs seemed much longer now and looked soft and milky to touch.

...Wait a minute, is he wearing pants?

Kanda blinked. If he could see that much of Allen's legs...holy crap, he's not wearing pants. Kanda felt his face warming up with embarrassment. He quickly turned around.

"...Allen?"

"Yeah?"

"Are you wearing pants?"

"Nope. Shorts."

"Shorts?" Kanda peeped over his shoulder. Allen was now facing him, looking a little confused as to why Kanda was turned around.

"Yeah. Lenalee got me them. See?" Allen lifted the lower part of his t-shirt that was covering his shorts. Kanda didn't make a sound.

"...Those are really short...shorts."

"Mhm. They kinda gave me a wedgee at first, but the extra movement is nice." Kanda nodded.

"I see."

"Yeah. Aw..no more cookies. Oh well, time to wash them down..." Allen said to particularly no one. He lifted the milk jug to take a swig...and in a flourish, spat the drink out onto a floor. "Ew! What the hell? This milk is way past its expiration date! Why would Jerry keep spoiled milk in his refrigerator..?" Kanda was still silent, his mind not wondering about the overdue milk, but rather how...inappropriate...Allen looked at the moment.

Allen had the gooey white substance on several places of his face, mostly his face, but a fleck of white on his cheek and a thin trail of milk sliding down from the corner of his lip. Oh jeez, now the oblivious kid was pathetically trying to wipe away the gross stuff without making any more of it come in contact with his mouth. (All in while, having his lips tucked into a pout. Oh, Allen how you tease our male protagonists..)

Kanda, of course, was stunned by the sight and his brain partially shut down.

"...Hey, Kanda...Kanda, are you there? Kaaaaanda?"

"...Don't say my name like that. You'll sound like the baka usagi."

"Whatever, can you please just hand me a towel so I can get this sick crap off me?" Kanda nodded and handed him a paper towel which Allen promptly put to use, first wiping his face then making an attempt to clean the mess he'd made. "Eww. This gross stuff is getting on me again." Kanda twitched.

"..Moyashi. Get changed and go to bed. I'll clean up the rest." Allen blinked, surprised, he'd thought that Kanda would most likely be getting a kick out seeing Allen make a fool of himself.

"Really? You would do that?"

"Sure. Just go." Allen smiled.

"Thanks, Kanda. Y'know, you're not that big of a jackass after all. Night." And with that, the white-haired 'girl' left the room. Kanda breathed a sigh of relief then looked at the mess on the floor and groaned.

"...Dammit."

XDXDXD

'What a surprise. Kanda actually being helpful. Yuck, the milk on me is starting to stink..' Allen thought as he tiptoed his way back to his room.

"Oof! What the heck the was that?" said a voice as Allen felt himself walk into stranger for the second time. ...Was that Lavi's voice?

"Lavi, is that you?" Allen asked the not so mysterious stranger.

"Ah! How do you know my name? Who are you? Are you a thief? How'd you get in here?" Allen mentally sighed at the barrage of questions. Yep, it was definitely Lavi, all right.

"Calm down, Lavi. It's me, Allen." Lavi breathed a sigh of relief.

"Oh, okay. Sorry about that." Allen nodded, although it was nearly impossible to tell that he had done so in the darkness, but Lavi caught the gesture when he felt someone's head briefly bump into his arm.

"Sorry, that was your arm wasn't it?"

"Yeah. It's fine. Hey Allen?"

"Yes, Lavi?"

"You smell really, really bad."

"That would be the spoiled milk I accidentally tried to drink." Lavi nodded and bumped into Allen. "Okay, I think we need to take one step back."

"Agreed."

"Better?"

"Much. So, I'm guessing you got hungry and decided to sneak some food." Allen blinked.

"How'd you know?" Lavi sighed. Allen really wasn't aware of the insane amount of food he consumed every day. The guy thought he had as much of a normal appetite as anyone else.

"Had a hunch. Um, Allen? Remember that stuff I said back in the cafeteria..?" Lavi asked cautiously. Allen frowned at the strange memory.

"About how you called me the 'girl of your dreams'? Then yes, yes I do." Lavi paled. Holy shit, had he really said that? When he'd finally come to, Lenalee explained to him what had happened to Allen, she hadn't said that Lavi had called Allen _that_. Oh god..

'You just said some weird and embarrassing things, is all. Nothing to be worried about. I'm sure Allen won't take any of it to heart.'

Weird and embarrassing was an understatement. Lavi thought that perhaps he'd just have said "Hey there, pretty lady." or any of his other pickup lines, but nothing like _that_. Thankfully there was no light in the corridor the two were standing in or else Allen might have thought that Lavi had come down with a fever.

"...Yeah, that...I-I didn't know what I was saying. You see, I was..I was...delirious! Yeah, delirious! So...yeah. Disregard everything I said, okay?" Allen wasn't really sure what Lavi was getting at, but he nodded anyway.

"Sure...good to know...I guess. Well, I've got to go, it's getting pretty late and I smell pretty bad still, so goodnight." And with that Allen left, leaving Lavi to regret that he'd ever gone in search of Allen in the first place, because surely, it was a prelude of what was to come. A hellhole of awkwardness and constant blushing.

XDXDXD

_The Next Day- Morning_

"Well, well, well? Do you like it, Alle-chan?" demanded Jerry. Allen blinked.

"It looks great, Jerry. And please don't call me that." Jerry smiled and jumped up and down happily. Lenalee, Miranda, and Allen just looked away, the image of a grown 'man' jumping around all excitedly, a sight too much to bear for their virgin eyes.

"I'm glad you think so, Allen. Jerry and I very worked hard on it." Miranda said calmly. Allen smiled and nodded. When she wasn't training to improve her Innocence or apologizing, Miranda liked to doodle and design. One day, Jerry came across one of her designs and just like that, the Black Order uniform version two was created. Soon after, the two worked to created the third version.

Jerry had enlisted the help of Miranda to assist him in creating Allen new outfit. It was still the same style as everyone else's but with some minor adjustments. The top half sustained the most changes. The sleeves were detached and the length of the shirt only went two inches past Allen's belly button. The lower half only consisted of a matching pair of shorts and a belt. As for footwear, a pair of long, black boots. Along with Allen's single white glove, the outfit was complete.

"Well, it's comfortable. But..I'm not sure I'll be able to fight in it.." Allen commented, missing his old uniform. Lenalee smiled softly.

"Then let's test it out. Reever said some Finders spotted a couple of Level 1 and 2 akuma not very far from here. " Allen nodded, he'd been wanting to get some training in.

"Toodle-lo! And Alle-chan, if you might just happen to dirty that outfit up, I might set tonight's chicken dinner on fire!" warned Jerry rather happily with a smile. Allen turned pale.

XDXDXD

"W-what if he's not bluffing? What if Jerry really does scorch the chicken? Aw, it's too horrible to imagine!" Allen cried out, desperately praying that Jerry spare the delectable food.

"I'm sure he's kidding. Now come on, we've got to hurry up if we want to catch up with that Level 2!" shouted Lenalee as they ran from rooftop to rooftop to catch the runaway akuma. They had successfully destroyed and purified the rest of the Level 1's and 2's but a lone Level 2 had gotten away amidst all the fighting.

"Why don't you go ahead and take the last one, Lenalee. I've already gotten my training in and you've been cooped up in the Headquarters taking care of Komui for so long.." Lenalee's face lit up.

"Really? Well, o-okay, Allen. I'll catch up with you later, then. Bye!" With a flash, Lenalee's Dark Boots activated and she disappeared. Allen waved then stopped to stretch. Gladly, his Crown Clown hadn't changed at all and was still as puffy and white as ever. (Allen wondered in horror what he might have done if his Crown Clown had turned girly as well...fight with a paper bag over his head most likely)

He jumped down from the two-story roof, managing to land quietly in an alleyway then blend into the crowd inconspicuously. 'I wonder if any new shops have opened up. Oh, maybe the chef at that one bar finally completed his latest desert...I've been looking forward to trying out the food there.' Allen thought as he strolled past the street vendors who sold anything from snow globes and plastic jewelry to frog hearts and snake eyes.

Allen made another left and finally arrived at his destination, The Straw Hat. It was a tiny hub run by a salty, green-haired swordsman and his employees that served delicious food to both the locals and tourists in the area. Sadly, because the rumor that the manager was an ex-pirate, the hub got few customers outside of the shady and 'up-to-no-good' types . Allen had only visited the place once and that was because it was his first time in the town and he got lost. The chef (who sported a strangely curly eyebrow) gave him a sandwich that tasted out of this world and directions back to where he was headed.

As Allen entered the place the bell above the door chimed, signaling his arrival. Most of the patrons in the bar paid no attention to the newcomer, but a few faces turned to see him. One, belong to the of the workers there whom Allen remembered from his last visit, a tall girl with orange hair and a big bust. The other two were a pair of thuggish-looking brutes who were eying Allen in a way that made him feel rather uncomfortable.

'W-why are they staring at me like that? Do I have something on my face? ...Oh right. White-haired person with a strange scar. Who wouldn't stare a weirdo like that.' Allen thought as he sat down on the near the counter. The server walked towards him.

"Ah, have we met before? You seem to resemble one of our old customers...oh, sorry for rambling! So, what'll you have? Our special today is Parmesan Chicken with a side of steamed and seasoned vegetables." Allen nearly drooled as he imagined said food.

"I have the special please." The girl scribbled something on her notepad then went into the kitchen. As soon as the server left the room, Allen found himself cornered by the two men staring at her before. 'W-what is going on..?' Allen thought anxiously.

The guy on his left smiled crookedly, showing off his pair of yellow and somewhat missing teeth. "Hey there, sweet cheeks. What's a little girl like you doing in such a bad place like this?" Allen shivered at the tone of his voice.

The other man smiled as well, his dental hygiene and breath no different from his friend. "If you've lost your parents, don't worry. Ed and me will gladly be your daddies for the night." Allen felt a large arm wrap itself around his waist. 'Holy shit, holy shit. Personal space bubble being shot down right now. What's wrong with this guys? I'm a...girl. Oh noo...'

Allen had failed to remember the fact that, technically, he was a girl now. And that girls have a different set of rules than guys. Being a girl, one could not just waltz into a bar that everyone in town knew was occupied by the vagabonds, criminals, and the lowest of the low while also wearing an outfit that did nothing to hide a female's more appealing points of their body. All of this Allen had forgotten and had so naively done so. Leading him to be in the situation he was in now.

(And it didn't help that Allen made _quite_ the cute gender-bend)

'Crap. What am I supposed to do? Using Innocence against regular human beings is forbidden and beating these guys' faces in could start a bar fight or something. Ah...Lenalee didn't tell me how to get out of situations like this. Oh, I wish I'd just gone ahead and chased after the akuma with her. At least then I wouldn't have a big, ugly sweaty guy's hand on my waist...that is slowly sliding down to my ass. What the fuck! Okay, okay, calm down, Allen. Just...just play it cool...'

Allen eyes flitted back and forth between the two grimy men. He forced a small smile and tried to get up from his chair. "T-thanks. But I've got to go now. My friend's waiting for me.." One of the men, Ed, grabbed his shoulder and pushed him back into his seat.

"Hold on, sweetie. We don't even know your name yet. Jack 'n me want to get to know you." Not having much experience in sex-talk and romantics, Allen didn't quite understand the innuendos the two were using but knew that in no circumstance that "getting to know you" was a good thing. Allen gingerly removed Ed's hand from his shoulder, but to his disgust, Jack placed his hand on thigh.

'Ew, what's Jack short for? Jackass?' Allen desperately wanted to ask just that but bit back his tongue. 'Play it cool and somehow shirk off these perverts' was the plan and if he wanted it to work then he'd have to stick to it.

Again, Allen removed another hand from his body and got up, this time a little more forcefully. "Thanks, but no thanks. No if you'll excuse me, I really, really have to go." And again, one of the men got up and pushed her down.

"Look, I'm sure your friend can wait. Stay and play some games with us." Jack said, cupping Allen's chin and leaning in far too close for comfort. "Now come and give ya' daddy a kiss." Allen snapped.

"GET THE HELL OFF OF ME, YOU CREEP!" Allen yelled as he punched Jack square in the face , sending the man a wriggling mass of flesh to the floor.

"Jack! Alright, you bitch, now you're gonna get it." Ed warned, getting up and cracking his knuckles. The other men in the were starting to get up and crowd around Allen as well. 'This isn't good...wake up, Jack...I didn't mean to hit you. Well, I did because you're a fucking creep, but..ahh. Dammit. I can't just beat up everyone else in the room. That would just cause more of a bad reputation for this place and I'll probably get in trouble. Shit, why does life hate me?' Allen thought miserably as more and more sweaty, stinky men surrounded him.

Suddenly the slammed open. "ALLEN!" Everyone, including Allen, turned to face the newcomer. 'Red hair...eye patch. LAVI!'

"Lavi, what are you doing he-ah!" Lavi dug through the crowd and grabbed Allen, dragging him out of the Straw Hat and into the streets.

"Get them!" Ed commanded as everyone ran out of the hub and after the two.

"...Are they gone?" Allen whispered from high up in a tree.

"Yeah." Lavi replied from within a barrel. Allen jumped down from the tree and lifted the top off the barrel. Lavi popped up and smiled. "Tada. Pretty nice save, don't you think?" Allen chuckled and nodded.

"Mhm. Thanks, Lavi. I owe you one. But, how did you know where I was?" asked Allen curiously. Lavi scratched his head sheepishly.

"Well, I like to go the Straw Hat sometimes and..collect information."

"You like the server girl, don't you?" Allen deadpanned. Lavi smiled, guilty as charged.

"She's like...a 9.5." Allen nodded uninterestedly.

"That's nice. But how did you know I was there at the time?"

"I snuck out and was planning on going there, but I heard a few people outside the building talking about a cute white haired girl with a strange scar. I figured it was you and watched the going-ons from the window." Lavi explained.

"And you didn't feel like helping me out when I was being hounded by those perverts?" Lavi shook his head.

"'Course not. Heroes show up at the last moment to save the day." Allen sweatdropped. Typical Lavi. Well, he was still grateful that Lavi showed up when he did. Even if he was a little bit late.

Allen coughed and stared at the ground. "Well, anyways. Thank you for coming to my...rescue, I guess. I appreciate it." Lavi looked surprised but smiled.

"Well, you're certainly welcome. Hey, are you hungry?" Allen looked at him quizzically.

"Is that a rhetorical question? But, yes. Yes, I am."

"Then wanna go and grab something to eat? I know this town inside and out and there's a nice café not too far away from here." Lavi offered. Allen's face lit up.

"Sounds great. Aw, I just remembered that I never got to try the special..." Allen murmured disappointedly. Lavi patted his friend's back.

"It's okay, Allen. Come on, they even have an ice cream bar." Allen snapped out of his depression and grabbed Lavi.

"Well then, what the heck are we waiting for?" he asked incredulously.

* * *

A/N- oh god. i finally finished this chapter. i made so many changes in plot and re-thought out so many things. hoo, it was a mess. but HAHA it's done. take that procrastination. :D i hope it was good. (oh, and did anyone catch the 'hidden' crossover?) ps- allen's punch was a falcon punch. so yeah, jack's in a lotta pain.

hm. as you can probably tell, i like to put a lotta humor into my stories. but i'm going to be including various events from the manga in this story so it won't be 'funny-haha-tyme' all the time. it's -man after all. things don't stay funny for long. T_T

okay! i'm gonna answer a fewwww of your questions. some of them, i can't really answer...because, well it will give away at the later plot and if i do answer those questions i'm not gonna be horribly descriptive. sorry. (but i gotta say. you guys totally guessed some of the future events and that made be both mad (coz it's supposed to be a super awesome surprise, but oh well. -_-) and impressed)

-Will Allen go back to being a boy again? (Midnight Hell and anyone else who asked pretty much the same question)

Eventually, yes. But, I'm going to have him face hell and back before I give him back his man card.

- What would happen if she/he started having their period? (BloodCoveredKisses)

I actually thought of maybe having that as one of those 'funny-haha-tyme' moments, but I'm very technical about my stories and having a period would mean like...the possibility of like...a kid. (I'm kinda of indecisive whether or whether or not there should be a lemon. it's rated T but...I've got an active imagination) I'm a cruel authoress who likes to genderbend her characters to entertain the masses but, I'm not that mean. So that's good for Allen, I guess. (Don't question how Allen can have a female anatomy but escape his time of the month. Just accept it)

- Meeting Cross while in she-form? (fan girl 666 and nobody)

=_=...shhhhhh. but yes. it'll happen. sometime.

-Big chest, small chest? (MiSa-sama-MiSa-chan)

Kinda answered before in a different chapter, but if it's not clear- smaller than Lenalee, bigger than Road. ;D

-Kobayashi?

Yeah, I fucked up. I...sniff...forgot. I so ashamed...;AAA; but I'll be going with Moyashi from now on.

-Human!Millenium Earl included in the harem? (Zirkus)

Ooh! Nice one! I hadn't thought of that. But, I can't really work that one out with how everything is planned. But Human!Millenium Earl will be making plenty of appearances. (coz i think he's good-lookin' =w=b)

And that about wraps up the questions. If you've got more questions, write em in with your reviews and I might answer them. :DDDDD

Harem Time~ So far we got: Lavi, Kanda, Tyki (oh, i gotta say, poker pair is just one of my most favorite pairings out there. so expect to see a lot of him later on!), Bak (very nice job. i completely forgot about the Asian Branch. which fails coz i'm asian myself :P), and Devitto (this one came from my mind)

still taking suggestions. and the poll for the end pairing is coming up sometime later.

i don't have a link to the spinoff on adultfanfiction b/c i don't have an account there plus i'm not sure if she's posted it there yet. i'll ask and then give anyone who wants a link, a link.

Please review, because the more reviews notices I see in my inbox the more guilty I feel and the sooner I'll start working on TGBI and update it. :DDD


	4. Chapter 4

**READ THE AUTHOR NOTE!**

**A/N- hello to anyone who still bothers to read this ballad to procrastination and yaoi. cobalt's not dead, just really busy and lazy. lethal combination for an authoress, i know, but still. here's the second version of chapter four (the first one came out really crappy and boring). fluff/pairing-wise it's broken up into thirds. first part is lavi/allen fluff which you should all be familiar with by now. and the last two are yullen stuffies.**

_alright, just wanna get this out before i start the chapter. i've been getting A LOTTT of anon reviews during the past few days. and that wouldn't be such a bad thing...if they weren't all just random spam and words. i know you guys (the anons) probably didn't mean any harm and i'm thrilled you like my crappy fic that much but seriously. STOP. _

_to me, those aren't legit reviews. but spam and extra annoyance. (like text-bombing a person. yeah. not cool) plus, you guys took my first 100th review (i've never gotten a hundred reviews before =A=) and that really...pissed me off. like i was planning to do something special with the hundredth review and was gonna send the reviewer something kewl! but...since you're anonymous...yeah, can't really do it. kinda killed my buzz there._

_i'd appreciate it if you either got an account so that i could contact/PM you or if you just reviewed once or twice...instead of seven times in a row. literally, i woke up today and there were seven reviews of blahhh in my inbox. T_T so yeah. do that...or i'll have to start deleting reviews or worse, blocking anonymous reviews. sorry. but i'm really at the end of my rope. thanks for taking the time to spam me though! XDDD in strange way, i feel loved. owwwo i'm not angry with you guys, but please please, just do this. it'll make it so much easier on cobalt. ;AAAA;_

**warning- satire deconstruction of characters, anarchism stew, and randomness. among my usual butchering of my favorite characters.**

**not beta'd, but hey, it's an update. and a long one at that. enjoy.**

**Disclaimer- cobalt no own dgm b/c if she did then the chapter wouldn't be monthly, they're be biannual. (i procrastinate..a lot) nor do i own any other characters i use from other mangas.**

**Chapter Four**

**Russian Roulette**

Heavy and lumbering footsteps echoed throughout the decrepit mansion, a trail of freshly spilled blood following each step. The man stopped briefly catch his breath and spit out the mixture of saliva and blood that had been collecting in his mouth. He continued to trudge forward, stopping again when he reached a door at the end of the hallway, he cautiously opened it, half expecting a dead body to come falling out. Such thing did not occur so the man quickly went in and barricaded the door with the weight of his back.

With trembling fingers he removed the phone on his back and placed it in front of him and dialed the only number the machine could contact. He waited a few seconds before a feminine voice answered on the other end.

"Hello. Black Order headquarters, Europe branch. May I have your finder code and name please?" she asked in a bored monotone.

"Hello? Yes, 03495E, my name is Jakob Hadler and I have an urgent report for a possible Innocence shard...a-actually, it's more a collection of them. They're all being held in-" the lady cut him off.

"Alright, first I need your location, Mr. Hadler and a more concrete explanation of the situation." Jakob scowled and felt a sharp sting of pain from his recently re-opened wound that..thing he had encountered earlier, had given him. He wasn't sure what it was, an akuma or..

_Creak..._

_Creak..._

_Creak..._

He heard small footsteps and the faint sound of mechanical whirring. Damn, they had found him already? Time was running short and he had to alert the Black Order about this place.

"The location is some rundown village two miles east of Chelyabinsk, Russia. It's a farm town with a creepy rundown mansion at the top of this hill. I don't know the actual name of the village...yes, I know. Will you-...will you just listen to me?" Jakob listened to her still monotonous, irritated voice argue back at him. Eventually she calmed down and allowed him to continue.

"You've got to send some exorcists here, ASAP. And top-notch ones, there's a two people here. Wait, no, only one of them is human, the other is some hellish humanoid machine that the other one, a girl, uses to- can you just let me finish? They're twisted monsters, both of them. Countless villagers, and I wouldn't be surprised if there were finders before me who came across this place...but all of them have been killed by these two. Slaughtered. And I think I'm next on the l-" he stopped and felt something pierce his throat. Jakob dropped the phone receiver in shock.

A thin and sharp copper cord had been penetrated the wooden door and went right through the back of his neck and out his trachea. Blood immediately started to fill his throat and spill out from the corner of his mouth. Jakob made a feeble attempt to pull himself away from the cable but a sharp jolt of high-voltage electricity came coursing out from the cord and into his neck and body, killing him instantly.

The burnt body slumped over and the door opened, pushing the corpse off to the side. Two figures walked in, one of them cloaked in heavy winter wear. It was freezing in the forgotten Imperial Russian mansion. The other wore a unbuttoned parka with a hood covering its face. From its stomach was the source of the cord that had pierced Jakob. With the flick of the girl's wrist, the cord came back and recoiled itself in her companion's stomach.

A pair of hardened blue eyes scanned the room, eventually stopping on the dropped receiver and phone belonging to the late finder she and her companion had recently killed. With another flick of the hand, a piece of jagged copper appeared out of thin was sent into the machine followed with another jolt of electricity, frying the piece of equipment much like what had happened to its possessor.

"Another one down. Let's go, mother." the girl said briskly, leaving the room, her 'mother' following closely behind.

XDXDXD

_At The Straw Hat_

"Hmm..a girl with white hair, you say? Oh, you mean the one customer who left before she could get her order? Yeah, she came in here. Why, she your girlfriend?" the orange-haired server asked teasingly. Kanda scowled.

"Na-nami-chan..." the man on the floor muttered. Nami simply shoved her heel further in the beaten man's fleshy face.

"No. I just need to know where she ran off to." Kanda replied. Nami placed her chin between her thumb and forefinger in thought.

"Well, I'm not sure. I was in the kitchen beating up the cook for sexual harassment when she left. Oh! But I'm sure Jack here knows where she went." Nami said, lifting Jack up from the floor to face the exorcist. Kanda's glare intensified upon seeing the pudgy man.

"White-haired girl with a red scar on her face. Where did she go?" Kanda bit. Jack gulped, scratching the back of his head sheepishly.

"Ah...if you're talking about that cute lookin' broad me n' Ed hit on, then yeah, chick ran outta the place with a redheaded guy. Ed n' the rest of the guys took off after 'em." Kanda sighed. Lavi, that buffoon. Jack looked nervous. "Look man, that's all I know. Honest." Kanda nodded to Nami, who promptly dropped Jack back onto the floor.

Kanda turned and began walking towards the exit. Nami smiled and waved. "Bye! Good luck finding your girlfriend."

"She's_ not_ my girlfriend." Kanda said slamming the door as he left. Nami sighed.

"Ah, young love."

XDXDXD

From the perspective of any other regular person, the image of two teens of different gender sitting together at a table laughing and conversing over a cup of coffee and some biscotti at the local cafe was commonly seen as a 'date'. The two teenagers sitting at said table doing such act of merriment were no exception.

The redheaded boy with the eyepatch leaned forward and whispered something in the silver-haired girl's ear and she in returned laughed. Then the boy laughed because the girl laughed and together...they laughed. Yesiree, this was your typical date.

A few adults glanced over and gave a small smile at the two teens and remarked on fond memories of their own dates 'back in the day'. There were even a handful of envious girls muttering bitterly over their lack of male companions and cursing the happy couple to a doomed relationship.

But, as with most things, there was more than meets the eye about the two adolescents. It was highly unlikely that anyone could tell that they were two exorcists working under a militant-religious order who had snuck out for some R&R. And it was even more unlikely that anyone knew that the girl who already downed five cups of coffee and eleven pieces of biscotti and coffeecake (the caffeine was also starting to have an effect on the girl, seeing as how she was jittering with laughter and hyperactivity) was actually not a girl at all.

That the hyper silverette was actually, in fact, a guy who had been turned into a girl by twisted cake-related means through the consumption of a demented potion created by an equally demented scientist with a sister complex the size of his ego. Which was pretty damn big, for those of you who couldn't already tell.

The boy-turned-highly attractive-girl was also the prophesized Destroyer of Time destined to come in conflict with the malevolent entity known as the Earl of Millennium and that the outcome of their battle would decide the fate of humanity. And the life as we know it.

Yeah. That's some pretty deep shit right there.

And that wasn't the end of it either, the boy had some hidden attributes about himself that most people wouldn't have guessed about him. Like the girl he was conversing with, the boy was also an exorcist but he belonged to a neutralist clan of historians and truth-seekers known as Bookman. So however the whole thing with the Millennium Earl and the Destroyer of Time thing worked out, it really wouldn't have an effect on the boy. Bookman supposing to have a lack of heart and all.

So in short, those two teenagers had some really fucked up backgrounds.

But having a messed up a past doesn't mean they don't have the right to party hard and have fun, right? The correct answer is no, by the way. Thus, we carefully observe the so-called 'date' between these two individuals to see if the outcome of their date will be as equally messed up as they are.

XDXDXD

Lavi watched with great amusement as Allen took another sip of his sixth cup of coffee. In his first few years as Bookman's apprentice, coffee had been Lavi's lifesaver, keeping his awake as he filed through the endless pages of history books and political documents. Naturally, he was omnipotent to any of its side effects by now.

However with Allen it was another story. Training with Cross, his master kept the boy awake with surprise punches in the face and the sound of him and his female companions engaging in 'adult nighttime activities' as Cross put it. Coffee was a new thing for the exorcist. And the caffeine really seemed to make the poor kid a little cuckoo, but it was sure as hell funny to listen to him babble on about things in his jumpy, hyped-up state.

"Whoa, look at the size of that lady's butt. It's huge like...like King Kong huge. She must eat like a boatload of cake everyday to get a bum that big. And it doesn't help that she's built like a frikkin' tank either. I'd rather have Kanda stab me a million times than die by having that lady sit on me. Ooh, food..." Allen jabbered, forking a piece of cake into his mouth. Lavi bit back his hysterical laughter. Caffeine made it so that Allen's every thought was spoken out loud. Needless to say, the boy had some interesting opinions on a variety of things.

"There's a fly in my soup, Lavi. A flipping fly swimming around in my delicious soup. I'm going to dump some salt on it and see if it shrivels up and dies." Allen said, wide-eyed, his hand inching towards the salt shaker. Lavi smiled and stopped his loopy friend's hand from seizing the salt.

"There is no fly in your soup, Allen. We're not even having soup. This is a coffee shop, the closest thing they have to soup here is a watery latte. And the salt thing only works with snails and stuff." Lavi reasoned with the boy. Allen paused and pulled back his hand and placed it under his chin in thought.

"I wish had some soup for flies to swim in then. Oh and you should hold my hand more. Your hands are super duper soft and nice feeling." he said, innocently holding out his hand. Lavi choked on his bite of bagel.

"W-what?" Lavi sputtered, eyeballing Allen's outstretched hand curiously. It wasn't as though he didn't _want_ to hold the boy's hand. But Allen really wasn't in a right state of mind at the moment and it really just wouldn't feel right...holding his hand without proper permission, of course.

"Holddddd myyyy handddd, Laaaaviiiiii!" Allen said, annunciating each syllable carefully. Lavi blinked, a blank look plastered on his face.

"Uh...I think that's enough coffee for you, Allen." Lavi replied, reaching over and pulling the double sugared mocha flavored cuppa' joe away from the young girl. This time it was Allen's turn to place his hands' over Lavi's. The red head stiffened as Allen pulled his hand away from the steaming cup of coffee and over to the center of the table. "W-what are you doing, Allen?" he asked.

Allen looked up and blinked before grinning. "'Dunno. Just something I saw a boy and girl do this one time when I was traveling with Master. So I thought since I'm a girl now, we should do it too." Allen giggle and grinned again. Lavi felt a warm heat rush up to his cheeks. Oh god this was getting...weird. Maybe they should have just gone back to the Black Order instead of coming here..

"Uh, Allen.."

"Shh! Alright, gimme the other hand." Allen demanded, Lavi did so and placed his free hand in Allen's right hand. I mean, might as well go with the flow, right? 'If you can't beat them, then join them' kinda stuff. Plus Lavi was getting in his chest...felt weird..but nice. It was a good kind of weird.

"Lavi...I'm leaving you." Allen said somberly. ...Wait, what? What? WHAT? Allen's voice was drained of its previous excitement and his expression was indecipherable. Lavi opened his mouth then shut it, not sure what to say. Allen pulled his hands and began laughing. "Haha, that was what the girl said to the guy when I saw them. The guy had this shocked, sad face...just like yours!" Lavi forced a half-smile. For a moment he had really been worried there.

Wait, why would he be worried? Why would Allen 'leaving him' make him feel like sitting in a corner and sighing for the new five years of his life? Gosh, maybe the caffeine _was_ having an effect on him...

"Come on, let's do it again!" Allen exclaimed, taking a hold of Lavi's hands again. Lavi only smiled sheepishly and nodded 'Sure'. Allen cleared his throat and made several attempts to make his face look remotely serious until finally succeeding after a good five minutes of nonstop giggling and laughter. "Lavi?"

"Yes?" Lavi said, playing the part of the boy about to be dumped. Allen sighed softly.

"I'm leaving you for...Kanda!"

...

...

...

"THAT'S NOT ANY BETTER!" Lavi shouted. He wasn't expecting to be playing the part of the boyfriend with a floozy girlfriend who cheated on him with...jerks. And God, and why Kanda of all people? Allen and Yuu were like night and day and couldn't stand the sight of each other. Every one of their encounters began and ended with either a "Dumb Bakanda!" or "Stupid moyashi.". "I'm wayy better than Yuu, Allen! Why the hell would you wanna cheat on me with that grumpy soba lover anyway?" Lavi demanded. Allen frowned and shook his head.

"That's not what I meant, Lavi. I meant 'Kanda!' as in 'Hey, look! It's Kanda!' And there he is. Hi, Bakanda." Allen said, giving a toothy grin and small wave. Lavi gulped and slowly looked behind him. Sure enough, Kanda in all his fury and anger was there, glaring psychotically at the baka usagi before him.

"Hey...Yuu. How long have ya been there...standing behind me and...stuff." Lavi asked, choosing his words carefully. Kanda looked about ready to chop his head off.

"Long enough, baka usagi." was his reply. Ooh. Not good. Lavi began fidgeting in his seat and tried to squeeze out of the chair to make a break for it but Kanda pushed his chair in from behind him to the point where Lavi thought the end of the table was going to slice itself right through his gut. Kanda...wasn't...very...happy.

"That...that's a...surprise. You're...argh...not mad...are you...Yuu?" Lavi managed to choke out. Kanda kicked his chair in tighter and for a for a faint second Lavi saw a light at the end of the tunnel. It was a shame he didn't walk towards it because Lavi was positively sure Kanda was going to send him to the other end of the afterlife spectrum. The one with eternally burning flames and stuff. Yeah, not fun.

"I'm not mad, baka usagi. _I'm pissed_." Kanda hissed. Lavi felt his balls drop. Well...time to start praying like a crazy motherbitch. Kanda went on. "But you're lucky I don't have the time to beat your sorry ass into the ground. I'm here to get the moyashi over there. Dumb sister complex's orders."

...Dear God, please send Komui my sincerest gratitude and may you shower him with a thousand little Lenalees. And a nice tropical fruit basket too. Amen.

"Moyashi, let's go." Kanda barked. Allen stood up and brushed off several cake crumbs from his uniform shorts.

"My name is Allen, Bakanda, do I need to write it down? Lavi, gimme a pen. And what does Komui want?" Allen asked. Kanda 'che'd.

"How the hell should I know? He just told me to come and find you." he replied. Allen gasped as if a revelation had just come to him.

"What if he's finished the antidote! Holy cow, we gotta move! Let's go Kanda!" Allen cried, pulling Kanda by the sleeve out of the cafe. "Bye, Lavi!"

Lavi finally managed wring himself free of the chair's death grip and gave a small wave in Allen's direction. "See ya, beansprout!"

XDXDXD

_At the Black Order HQ_

Lenalee carefully removed the cast on her brother's left foot. Komui sighed, happy to have his dear sweet sister paying so much attention to him for once. Curse those friends of hers that always kept them from having the very important and precious "brother-sister bonding time" he had heard so much about. He smiled up at his dear sibling who kindly smiled back. Yep, this was the life.

No distractions.

No interferences.

And especially, no boys.

Just sweet Lenalee-chan and her awesomely cool and heroic older brother. Yes.

Komui could have sworn that having his body mangled by Allen's Crown Clown was the best thing that could have happened to his and Lenalee's relationship. Setting aside the actual time when Allen was slaughtering him, that was. Lenalee had just stood there with a sad smile on her pretty face. Sob...the betrayal hurt.

But it was all better now! Lenalee-chan devoted her time to tending to her Nii-san and making sure he would heal as quickly as possible.

'That way you can get to making that antidote for Alle-chan.' she said. Pah! That beansprout could stay a girl for the rest of his life for all he cared, he just wanted Lenalee's attention and love. Which he was prompting receiving at the moment. Yep, this was the life. So suck it, Allen. Your 'Kill that bastard, Komui' plan failed! Mwahaha-oww..

"How is that, Nii-san?" Lenalee asked. Komui moved his foot a bit. It felt good as new. He smiled at his sister sadly.

"Still kind of aches, I'm afraid." Lies. But they were to keep Lenalee-chan by his side a while longer, so they didn't really count. Lenalee frowned.

"Really? The nurse said your leg should be healed up by now. How strange." Komui shrugged.

"Allen's Crown Clown is super strong and painful. My weak human body could not handle its awesome destructive power." Komui sniffed, adding to his performance. Lenalee seemed to have bought it.

"Oh, big brother..." she placed his legs back on her lap and began massaging them. Oh yes, this is the life, indeed.

Komui shut his eyes and smiled peacefully. He was starting to get a bit sleepy...

...

...

...Zzz.

"KOMUI-SAN, I'M BACK! DID YOU MAKE THE ANTIDOTE YET?" the door slammed open and two people came walking in.

Komui shrieked and jumped up and flew onto the floor face-first. Lenalee gasped.

"Wow. The idiot scientist screams like a girl." Kanda noted. Lenalee scowled at him and bent down to help her brother up. Allen pushed past Kanda and helped Komui up as well.

Well...Allen's version of helping was just lifting Komui up by the arm that was broken and tossing him back onto his bed. ...But it was the thought that counts.

Komui groaned and pulled himself up into a sitting position. He promptly death-glared both Kanda and Allen for ruining the cool brother-lovely sister moment in their individual ways. Allen for yelling and causing him to face-plant on the ground then throw him over to his bed. And Kanda for...being Kanda.

"So, did you get to work on the antidote yet?" Allen asked tentatively. Komui turned slowly...very slowly to face the exorcist.

"No." he said. Allen pushed the subject no further.

"Oh..okay. Well, why did you have Kanda come looking for me?" Komui sighed and scratched the back of his head trying to remember exactly _why _he had done so.

"Uh...oh, right! I had a mission for the both of you." he recalled. Kanda frowned.

"Why do I always have to be teamed up with _him_?" he asked, glaring over at his 'partner'. Allen returned the glare.

"I feel the same way, Bakanda." he replied with same amount of venom. Lenalee smiled nervously.

"Getting along as always, I see."

"No, we're not!" they barked. Komui smacked them both with a rolled up newpaper.

"Hey! Don't yell at sweet Lenalee-chan like that, you brutes! Apologize!" Kanda and Allen both muttered words of apology toward Lenalee who kindly accepted them. "Anyways, back to the mission. The place you'll be travelling to is Russia-"

"Russia? That's really far away! I don't wanna be with Kanda for that long!" Allen interrupted. Kanda nodded in agreement. Komui smacked Allen with the newspaper again.

"Too bad! It'll give you two time to work on your public-health-hazard of a relationship." the two grumbled in a frustration. "Ah, where was I..? Oh yes. You'll be going to a small village in Russia where an eccentric, rich old lady used to live. Well, before she died." Komui added awkwardly.

"So? How does this relate the Black Order?" Kanda questioned.

"Hush! I'm getting to that part. In her will she put that all her money and assets will go to whoever can spend a full twenty-four hours in her mansion. A stupid idea because it's just asking for trouble, but she _was_ quite the eccentric. Crazy lady probably liked the idea of idiots trying to steal her fortune. Ahh..lost my train of thought...oh, got it. Of course, many attempted to do the twenty-four hours but most only make it to midnight before they come running and screaming out. Then there are some that are never even seen again."

"Why is that?" Allen asked. Komui shrugged.

"The townsfolk say it's haunted by some kind of ghost. How silly. It's most likely some trickster or worst-case scenario, an akuma. Oh and the most recent report has opened up the possibility of an advanced level akuma or some sort."

"So why do we have to stay there then?" Kanda asked. Komui fidgeted in his bed.

"...The Black Order needs some funds.." he muttered. Everyone was silent.

"...What?" Kanda asked again. Komui coughed.

"Well, every branch of the Black Order has a budget and uhh...we've reached ours. Needless to say, we're a bit strapped for cash and I figure this ought to be worth a shot. What with two hard-boiled exorcists like yourselves, the two of you could probably scare off a ghost or two just with your little banter. Plus there may or may not being some innocence there. The finder's report got messed up somehow. Weird things happen at that mansion.." Kanda and Allen glared at the man. Lenalee coughed and everyone's attention went to her.

"Kanda and Allen, you leave the headquarters tonight. Sorry for the short notice. Your finder will guide you to the town, please stay safe and good luck." she said. Allen smiled at her and nodded. Kanda grunted and the two left to pack.

She turned to face her brother who was pretending to be asleep and sighed. "Please, Nii-san, you can't possibly think that I can't tell you're faking sleep, right?" Komui slowly looked at her and smiled.

"Lenalee-chan is so smart..." he said innocently. Lenalee shook her head.

"Flattery will get you nowhere, brother. Anyway, it's getting late so I'm going to bed now." she put up a hand before Komui could convince her to stay. "But. I have someone who will look after you tonight. Jerry-san kindly offered to take care of you. Isn't that nice?" Komui paled.

Sure, he and Jerry were, like, total BFF's, but Jerry really didn't know how to be gentle. He gave a hundred and ten percent into everything he did. That was something that Komui admired about his friend, but in his current frail and broken position an extremely effeminate man who knew martial arts and lacked the ability to be gentle, was NOT what he needed.

"B-b-but, Lenalee-chan..." he sputtered.

"Good night." she said as she left the room. Oh no...he was too late. Komui scrambled out of bed to hobble after his sister, but screamed when he looked up.

"Komui-kun~!" Jerry cried, tackling his friend in a crushing man-glomp-hug. Komui yelped in pain and wrestled himself out of the demonic embrace.

"J-Jerry-san...how nice to see you..." he stuttered, climbing back into the protection of his hospital bed. Jerry walked over to Komui's bedside.

"Yes, yes. Oh, Komui-kun, when I heard you were hurt, I was so worried. But you're so lucky to have a kind sister like Lenalee-chan to look after you." Komui nodded. Yes..just think about dear, sweet Lenalee-chan...

"Yes..I am lucky.." Jerry nodded.

"But even angels like Lenalee-chan need to go to sleep sometimes." No, they don't! Angels are magical creatures, what do they need sleep for! "So that's why I'm taking over tonight! Don't worry! I'll be extra gentle since you're sick and all."

'Lies! Lies! Lenalee-chan, help me! Your super cool big brother is going to be killed!' Komui thought.

"Oh, you're looking a little pale. I can fix that! Nothing like a little Muay Thai massage to get the blood flowing!" Jerry said, popping his knuckles. Komui was hyper-ventilating in panic. "Ready or not...here I go~!"

And with that, the pain began.

XDXDXD

Allen stepped onto the gondola and sat down next to Kanda, who growled in disdain. Allen rolled his eyes in response. The gondola began to start its passage.

Allen stared at the calm water then glanced over at the finder sitting across from him.

Like most other finders, this one was a guy. He looked rather young to be a member of the Black Order, but then again so was Allen. The boy had scrappy brown hair and a pair of matching eyes. He had a skinny body and his only visible distinguishable feature that set him aside from the everyday finder was that he had a burn going from the side of his jaw and probably reached down to his neck, which was wrapped in white gauze.

The finder noticed Allen looking at him and took the chance to introduce himself.

"Hello, my name is Tune Marie. You must be Allen Walker and Yuu Kanda, don't worry Mr. Walker, I was made aware of your situation." he said. Allen smiled and nodded.

"Oh, that saves me the explaining. And please, just call me Allen. Also, you can call him Kanda. But nothing else or he'll cut you in half with his sword." he motioned at Kanda who grunted. Allen pursed his lips. "Your name sound familiar...do you have a sibling in the Order?" Tune nodded.

"Yes, you might know my brother, he's an exorcist as well. His name is Noise Marie."

"You're Noise's brother? Well then it's a pleasure to meet you. You're brother's a good guy." Tune grinned. "Hm. Noise and Tune Marie. That has a ring to it." Allen said. Tune chuckled.

"Our mom had a thing for music. Her name was Melody, even." The two laughed and continued chatting throughout the gondola ride. Kanda simply observed the sights as they traveled through the Black Order's many secret underground passageways.

XDXDXD

_Somewhere in Russia..._

Kanda growled in the back of his throat, shoving his gloved hands deeper into his pockets and hunching his body away from the furiously blowing snow they were currently trekking through. Three godforsaken days spent in the frozen wasteland and they still had no clue where they were and if they were even near their destination.

The first day had been pretty much a dud because by the time they got off the gondola the useless moyashi had practically passed out from a sugar crash. Kanda had to sling the idiot over his shoulder and carry him (Tune was already lugging around a giant backpack full of supplies and it wasn't like Kanda was _that_ heartless) around like the lazy sack of potatoes he was to their inn. And it didn't help that Allen kept squirming around and causing Kanda to almost fall over on one more than one occasion. He had begun to think that the moyashi was doing it on purpose. Then he heard Allen murmur something that made Kanda get a queasy feeling his stomach.

'Bakanda smells nice..'

First of all, piss off, moyashi. He would have dropped the puny exorcist on his empty head if Kanda hadn't been so unnerved by the latter of his comment. I mean, jeez, who goes around smelling people when asleep? Weirdos, that's who.

From then on Kanda just shut his trap and carried the sleeping girl, no questions asked.

During their second day, (and after Allen had finally woken up from his coffee-induced slumber) the trio had finally begun making some ground had successfully reached Russia's western border. However from there the trip began to spiral downwards even more. Nonstop snow and bitter cold winds made navigation virtually impossible and they quickly got lost and had been lost ever since.

"I-It hurts to breathe. The air feels likes it's mixed with ice and b-broken glass!" Tune noted through chattering teeth. Allen nodded and wrapped the scarf he had tied around his face even tighter, only his eyes and bangs were visible. He pulled the scarf down for a brief moment to talk.

"K-Kanda, how are you holding out?" he asked, quickly pulling the scarf back over his near-frozen lips.

"I'm fine...just freezing my ass off." Kanda grunted. He heard the moyashi faintly chuckle, but through the howling wind, it sounded more like haggard coughing.

"Aren't we all..." Allen replied. He stopped suddenly. "H-Hey, you guys...I think I heard the ground crack or something...do you think we're on-"

_CRACK!_

The snowy white ground below them collapsed and split apart, revealing pitch black water below. Allen scowled. 'Shit!' He hurriedly threw off his scarf and activated Crown Clown, using one hand to latch onto a more stable piece of ground and the other to pull the one closest to him, Tune, to safety.

_Splash!_

"Kanda!" Allen shouted. 'Dammit, dammit, dammit! Can he swim? Argh! Screw it!' He deactivated his Innocence and dove into the large hole they had created in the ice floe after the samurai.

"Allen!" Tune screamed, staring into the black pit of frozen water that sat in the middle of a frozen hell.

XDXDXD

_Kanda POV_

I seriously don't understand the what the hell just happened. One second I'm trudging through what I swear is the second Ice Age, then there's a loud crack and the next thing I know I'm underwater. Which is really, really, _really _bad...considering I never learned to swim.

...Shut up or I'll rip that stupid grin right off your face.

Anyways, it's pretty damn strange, being completely submerged underwater. It wasn't as freezing cold as it is above ground, which is surprising. Or perhaps it's just that my nerves have gone numb from the arctic weather I've been enduring for the past three days. Either way it's a real nice feeling just floating around like this. Water fills every nook and cranny of my body and since I'm underwater it doesn't feel even feel like I'm wet.

For a second I almost think that I'm back in the Asian Headquarters. Back in that pool of chemicals and fluids that I was born in. At least that's what I was told. Almost every memory of anything that happened before that time is gone. And the ones that remain...they're not something I want to talk about.

When I open my eyes I can see a circle of bright white that I suppose is the hole that I fell through. The circle is getting smaller and farther away each moment. I try to kick my legs and arms around to try and swim back up but my body is numb and heavy with the weight of the water pulling me farther and farther down. My chest feels about ready to explode and can hear my ears are pounding from the water pressure. I can already tell my pulse slowing down with each passing second so I shut my eyes, accepting what's coming.

_Splash..._

I catch the sound of breaking water and my eyes snap open. Through liquid goggles I see someone falling down towards me, both hands outstretched, trying to coax me to reach out and grab them.

Alma? No...

The thought of Alma ignites something in me. A sudden urge..no, a _will_ to live and fight on. I grit my teeth and mouth out a curse that rhymes with 'truck'. 'Like hell if I'm gonna die through _drowning_.'

With the last bit of my strength, I reach out and grasp the gloved hand. There's a quick flash from an Innocence being activated then, as fast as I fell through the ice, I'm thrown back out onto land. The sudden barrage of snow and subzero winds hit my body like a semi and I let out a yell of pain. I collapse onto the ground, weariness and pain overcoming my restless mind and body with a welcome blanket of sleep.

It's the moyashi.

XDXDXD

The first thing I notice- I'm alive. Shocking considering how long I went without oxygen and that sudden change in pressure that nearly ripped my insides apart. But then again, being a Second Exorcist can come in handy sometimes. Healing owns.

The second thing I notice- we're not outside in the middle of a blizzard anymore. On one hand I'm horribly grateful. (I can feel my skin slowly beginning to thaw out) However, if we're not outside shoveling through two feet of snow (sans the actual shovel), then where the hell are we?

I can smell the familiar scent of burning wood and the peaceful snapping of the fire breaking apart the wood. Through my eyelids I can see (technically not 'see' since my eyes are closed but still) an unnatural light trying to poke through. With great annoyance on my part, I force one eye open just slightly and scope out the place. Seems to be just a regular bed room to me. Only the design was a hideously log cabin-themed. All the furniture was carved from wood and the walls were all painted a warm burgundy. In the corner there was a brick fireplace with an average looking fire going on in it. A cozy wool blanket covered my body up to my neck, not that I'm complaining. I'm tired as hell.

Finally the third thing I notice- there is a big ugly moose head hung up on the wall and it's looking right at me. Antlers and all. And I thought the Black Order was tacky when it came to interior design.

I lay around for another minute and soak up the relaxing feeling of it all then get out of bed. Time to go back to work. I fold up the blanket before I leave, exiting the room from the door on the far left. It lead me to hallway with several more doors on each side. Trying to decide which door to check first, I glanced behind me and saw a little girl who looked no older than eight looking curiously up at me. I turn and stared back at the girl. Hey, she should know not to stare at people.

"Hello." she greets, her voice soft and girlish.

"Hi." I reply. She folds her hands behind her back and smiles up at me, bright blue eyes shimmering with excitement. "Uh, who are you?" I add gruffly, trying my best not to sound too mean. I've been told that I scare little kids. Pft, they just need to grow spines.

The girl bounces on the balls of her feet, making her long blonde pigtails shake a little. "My name's Ekaterina. You must be Yuu. Nice to meet you, Yuu." she says, all smiles. A tiny tick mark appears on my forehead and my eye twitches. I know she probably didn't do that on purpose but it still pisses me off. Pushing aside my irritation, I calmly ask her how she knew who I was.

"Oh! Your friend, um, Tune told me. He said that you're really sick and stuff and that both you and that pretty girl needed a place to stay. So I'm letting you guys stay here for a while. But you need to be careful. I didn't ask my mother. She's away right now." Ekaterina said, leaning in and whispering the last part. I nodded. She smiles cheekily at me. "That girl's really pretty. Is she your lover?" I froze. What the hell is up with people and asking about whether the moyashi was my girlfriend or not? If they only knew...

"No. She's not. Now where is the mo-uh, where is...she staying?" I ask.

"Ohh. So it's like a unrequited and stuff? I get what you're saying. Don't worry, she'll come around eventually. Ever try cologne? You reek in real bad way." I feel the corner of my lip twitch. Okay, this girl is really starting to rub me the wrong way. "And your lady friend's in the room over there. Be quiet though, okay? Last time I checked she was in a super deep sleep." Ekaterina said, pointing over to the room on the far left. I give her nod then walk over and open the door, careful not to make it squeak.

The moyashi was still asleep alright, wrapped from the neck down in a blanket similar to the one I had been using. I silently slip in the room and walk over to the bed, peering down on the beansprout. He was panting softly and his whole face radiated a sickly heat. Frowning, I placed my hand on the moyashi's forehead. Fever? The skin feels clammy and warm to touch. Allen turns slightly, tossing his head to the other side and coughing a bit.

I walk over to the wall and lean up against it, crossing my arms and glancing over at the moyashi again. I really hadn't thought about it up until now but the bean was the one who saved me before. It was strange how I had mistaken him for Alma. But they were alike in so many ways..

They both annoyed the hell out of me, that was for sure. Their personalities weren't too different either, always optimistic about every damn thing and always believing in their stupid, idealist dreams. Even their freaking smiles echoed each other. That goddamn fake smile...

_"'Cause you're my only friend, Yuu. I'm not going to let them take you away!"_

I growl and clamp my eyes shut, trying to push Alma out of my thoughts.

_"Isn't that right...Yuu?"_

Shut up...just...

"Hrph..Kanda? What are you.." Cough, cough. "doing here?" Allen asks, sitting up slowly from the bed, shivering slightly and still holding the blanket around himself. Before I could answer the beansprout interrupts me. "W-wait, where am I? I don't remember...Kanda, what's going on?" he stares up at me, a confused look in his eyes. I quickly explain what I knew of the situation.

"-but, the best person ask is Tune. I just woke up a few minutes prior." I finish. He just nods blankly, expression distant and unreadable. For a brief moment I'm a bit worried about the moyashi, he isn't acting his usual annoying self. And...that's weird.

"Ohh. Hey, Kanda?" I look up.

"Hm?" A pair of silver eyes slide over to me, a mischievous glint in them.

"You can't swim, can you?" he asks mockingly.

"Che. Piss off." And to think I thought something was wrong with the kid. The beansprout stumbles out of bed and leaves the room, chuckling softly at me. Damn him.

XDXDXD

_Normal POV_

The floor felt pleasantly cool against Allen's warm feet. Shivers jumped up and down Allen's body and his sinuses were killing him. He could feel a sneeze coming on, letting it loose on his sleeve. No snot, but plenty of germs, no doubt. It was just his luck to get sick on a long mission like this. And Allen was pretty sure he really got sick when he jumped into that icy water to save Kanda. Up until then it was just a baby cold and he could have easily fought it off.

'Sigh. This is what you get for trying to rescue a jerkass like Kanda,' Allen thought. The dummy had passed out the moment they got out of the water. So Allen had carry Kanda's unconscious butt. Tune was out of the question because the poor finder had landed on his ankle and sprained it when Allen pulled him away from the broken ice. Allen just couldn't get a break, could he?

His eyes scanned the hallway, looking for the door that led to the bathroom. All Allen wanted to splash some cool water of his face, which was burning up like crazy by the way. He randomly opened one door and surprisingly, it was the bathroom door. Maybe his luck was starting to take a turn for the better.

_Whoosh.._

The stainless steel faucet let out a steady flow of icy water which Allen happily splashed onto his face. 'Ahh...' He also took the chance to scrub off all the extra dirt and grit that had collected on his face the past three days. There were no rest stops in the Russian wilderness, he was afraid.

Eyes closed, Allen reached out and grabbed a towel hanging near the bathtub and used it to dry off his face. Just as he put the towel back on its rack, a pair of icy-cold, metallic hands wrapped themselves around Allen's mouth. 'What the-?' Allen thought, instinctively jutting his elbow out into his assailant's stomach and twisting around to land a punch square in the individual's face.

Unfortunately at that moment, Allen learned two things about the person who had taken him by surprise. One was that the moment he hit the person in the face, his hand, more specifically his fingers, all broke upon impact with his or her face. The other was that his attacker wasn't made of flesh and bone, but some sort of silver-colored metal and that a simple punch and sharp elbow in the ribs and gut were not enough to take them down.

Eyes wide with shock and horror, Allen watched as the metal he had dented in the strange being's face he had dented with his fist slowly popped back out into its original form. A pair of glassy eyes with long lashes and the soft curve of its nose taking shape. It was a woman's face. The thing reached out with its free hand and grabbed Allen's wrist and contorted it sideways behind him.

'AUGHH!' Allen thought, his cry of pain silenced by the cold silver hand tightly gripping his mouth. His body collapsed onto the floor as the metal woman pinned both his hands behind his back. The last thing Allen remembered was the sharp pain of a metal fist hitting the back of his head, knocking him unconscious.

XDXDXD

Tune looked up from his logbook as Kanda strode into the living room, an irritated look on his face.

"Kanda, you're awake!" Tune said, placing his pen in the spiral of his notebook and tucking it back safely in his backpack. Kanda glanced over at him and che'd.

"Obviously. Where's the moyashi?" he asked, gingerly setting himself down on one of the room's sofas. Even though his body had healed itself, it still felt sore and achy from the whole ordeal. Tune shrugged.

"I don't know. Is he awake? The last person who came in here was Ekater- oh, wait, have you-" Tune trailed off. Kanda nodded, his lips twisting in annoyance at the thought of the weird little girl. Tune gave the swordsman a small smile. "Yeah, she can be a bit of handful. But she's really a nice girl. She found Allen and I in a forest we had tried to take shelter in. If it weren't for her we would have a frozen to death." Tune chuckled at the last part, trying to make light of the situation. Kanda che'd again.

The room was silent for a moment.

Tune coughed. "We were really worried about you for a moment there, Kanda. Allen and I both." Kanda simply blinked and shrugged as if to say, 'For what? I'm fine.' Tune shook his head, the three days he had spent with the exorcist had given him an understanding of Kanda's brand of body language. "Really. Allen kept on checking on you every five minutes to see if you still had a pulse or not. He even took off his jacket and put it on you. He was afraid you might've had hypothermia or something."

Kanda frowned. Did the bean really care that much? And was that why he had been shivering so much back there? Because of him? A small pool of guilt began forming in his stomach. Suddenly Kanda's eyes snapped opened. He had just gotten a rush of absolute dread. Like something horrible had just happened...or was about to happen.

Coincidentally another figure entered the room at that very moment. Both Kanda and Tune turned to see who it was. 'Moyashi?' Kanda thought, expecting the person to be Allen. It was not. It was Ekaterina...and she had a strange expression on her face. She looked over at him, Kanda noticed how her eyes seemed to filled with regret and some other emotion he couldn't identify.

"You guys..." she started, pausing momentarily to sigh. "I'm really sorry, but my mother's home. And she wants you gone." Kanda frowned. Something felt very off. Tune sat up.

"Oh, well..that's fine. You've already helped us so much. We wouldn't want to burden you-" Ekaterina cut him off.

"No...she wants you _gone_. Goodbye you two." With that, another figure appeared behind her and two copper cords were sent into Tune and Kanda's shoulder.

"What the-" Kanda started to say.

_Bzzt!_

A stream of electricity was conducted into their bodies and the two fell to the ground, the sickening odor of burnt flesh enveloping the living room.

**A/N- good god, i'm finished. this took about maybe four days to write, so not toooo shabbyyy. F33 ooh! cliffyyyy! aren't i the nasty bitch. note- yes, it's a fact that kanda can't swim. it was on the dgm wiki. (yeah, i did actual research for this chapter. sad ain't it?) and the condition kanda was suffering from when he came out of the ice hole is a common, but dangerous, condition that occurs when a person stays in a pressurized environment for a while then are suddenly yanked out and put in a place with completely different air pressure. bubbles form inside the body from the change and it can cause a lot of pain and possibly internal bleeding. heavy water pressure in the ice hole...then thin air pressure on the surface equals pain. lots and lots of pain. allen didn't get the thing coz he only dived in quickly to save kanda. (if you can't tell, i'm a bit of a science nerd. xP)**

**teeeeeeheeeee. ekaterina is not my original character. she's from a different anime/manga. FIRST PERSON WHO CORRECTLY GUESSES WHAT ANIME/MANGA AND WHO SHE REALLY IS GETS A SPECIAL SURPRISE FROM COBALT! (if you're anon...gimme some way to contact you or it'll defeat the purpose) you'll also earn my respect as fellow otaku, coz this manga/anime..it's not exactly mainstream and as well known as other stuff...so if you do know. tops to you. ;D**

**some of you anons asked me few questions so i'll just answer them now while i have the time. What's a lemon? a lemon is a sex scene. idk if i'll write one...might just have someone else write it for me. and idk if it will be het or yaoi. i haven't read a het!lemon since i was ten. (yes. ten years old. readin' lemons. shaddup.) i'm fourteen now and verrry busy so not sure on what'll happen with that. stay tuned and find out i guess. ;D other question, allen should stay a girl- gonna tell you right now. not gonna happen. moyashi's trans-fo-mation back to a boy is gonna play an integral part of the story. sorry. =A=;;**

**LAST THING! THE POLL IS UP! GET YOUR ASSES OVER THERE AND VOTE! (it's been on my profile for like a month...haha...) the pairing that gets the most votes will get the lucky lady-guy. *looks at allen who's busy stuffing his face with food* -_-u yeahh. oh and if no one votes...i'm just gonna have my stupid friend...who's against pretty much all yaoi, choose for me. and she's allen/lenalee. yeahh...i don't think that's what most of you guys wants...is it? WELL THEN VOTE. VOTE TO KEEP THE YAOI!**

**Next Chapter- 'Cross My Heart' (also a song by marianas trench that gave me a lot of inspiration F333) this chapter will mark the end of the two-chapter russia/yullen-fluff arc. plus it'll have some new arrivals. one of which you will ALL appreciate. **

**that is all. toodles and all. *evaporates***

**READ AND REVIEW.**

**(AND VOTE TOO!)**


	5. Chapter 5

K/N- AKA, Kanda's note in case you all couldn't tell by my correct grammar and capitalization. Anyways, I've got something to say...WHY THE HELL AM I TRAILING **THIRD **IN THE POLLS FOR MOYASHI, HUH? Seriously, I'm behind both the baka usagi AND the pedo Noah. What. The. Hell. The moyashi is _mine_, okay? Now you better get your fangirling asses up there and vote because I've seen the version where I don't get the moyashi...and the usagi does. *dark emo-y aura* And it does not look too good for me. T_T

Winner of the contest thing was Greyfitti. Ekaterina's from Seikon no Qwaser, a hentai-ish, shonen manga there's she's called Katja. Her other names is Ekaterina Kurae though and yes, she is Russian. The main char. of Seikon is pretty much a more stoic carbon-copy of the moyashi though. They could be twins. Greyfitti chose a fanfic. Woo. *eyeroll* The fic's called _**Fourteen Things**_, go read it if you haven't already. It's Laven. (If only to flame it since it's not Yullen..)

Che. The Kitsune is a dirty liar. Remember how she said that this chapter would be the finally to the Russia arc? Mm, she lied. The Kitsune typed everything up and even before she was finished with the whole chapter, the word count came up to over 14,000. So to save you all the eyesore and headache, the chapter got cut in half. Also, don't get your hopes up about an overly-fluffy or yaoi-filled chapter because it's mostly just action and history stuff. Yeah. Sorry, I guess. But **there is an omake at the end of the chapter. Look out for that.**

Disclaimer- No, the Kitsune does not own DGM. If she did then there would be no plot. Just mindless sex of the homo variety. Yeah, no, thank you.

* * *

**Chapter Five**

**Cross My Heart**

_"Ohoho...what's this? Another lost soul in pain and misery?" said the Earl, looking down at the small child dressed only in tattered hand-me-downs huddled up against the grey tombstone. The Earl smiled slightly to himself, even though no one would be able to tell with his face contorted into that constant demented grin. Another easy prey. _

_"Tell me, miserable child, have you lost someone you care dearly for?" he asked. The child had been crying before but immediately stopped upon hearing the Earl's question and stared up at him. For a brief moment, the Earl was surprised by the unfeeling emptiness in the child's eyes. There was no feeling or sadness- only a hollow emptiness. He waited patiently for an answer._

_"How...can I lose someone...when I have never had ANYONE." the child spoke softly but there was an underlying angriness in the words as well. The Earl was silent for a moment then suddenly started laughing merrily. Oh yes, he had felt it before...this one was different all right._

_"AHAHAH. My dear, dear, broken child...you are indeed different. And I like that. So I offer you this...how would you like to make a deal with the devil, hm?"_

XDXDXD

_St. Petersburg, Russia_

There was a bitter taste in Allen's mouth when he woke up. He faintly recalled being attacked in the bathroom by that machine-like monster. It felt like it happened weeks ago by how groggy Allen felt. But his swollen, broken hand and the lump on the back of his head was fresh and ached like crazy, telling him otherwise.

His head was throbbing and his body was cold and chilly from the dampness of the room Allen was currently in. Allen slowly sat up, feeling his arms and legs move up against the grainy grit from the floor. It felt like he was sitting on dirt after a light rain shower...just where was he? The room was dark with not a light to be seen as far as Allen's eyes could see. If he wanted to find out where he was- and get out of it, he'd have to feel his way around in the dark.

Allen first tried to move forward but found his ankles were cuffed by a pair of heavy iron chains that made a muddled clinking sound whenever he moved his foot around. Strange. However he'd been through worse during his days with Master Cross. (Those were days Allen hoped to never have to relive..) But back to the chains, Allen took the metal links and reeled them in until they reached the end and he felt himself tugging at the chain's anchor- the wall. He had estimated about four and a half meters. A bit much if they (whoever _they_ were) wanted to keep someone prisoner.

Deciding to move onward with his plan to explore the place a little bit, Allen began crawling forward. As he went crawling further along to study the room he suddenly came across a wall, finding the structure via his noggin accidentally bumping into it.

"Ouch! That freaking..! Argh...my head..." Allen cried, pulling back to gingerly nurse the newly formed bruise on his abused cranium. Once done tending to his injury, Allen reached his hand out again and found the wall. He moved his hands to the side and almost fell forward when he fingers came in contact with...well, nothing. Apparently the wall was not a wall as Allen had first thought, it was a doorway that was either open or lacking an actual door. Allen pulled at his chain to see how much farther he could go. The rustle of the corroded iron said two to three meters. Allen took it and crawled forward, wincing every time he stepped on something gross-feeling and/or sticky. He was only wearing the nightgown he had been given earlier. The article of clothing being only a spaghetti-strap nightgown that barely went down a little past his knees. The moist, chilly air was very uncomfortable and was starting to give Allen goosebumps.

As soon as he moved past the doorway, Allen saw that the next room was not as pitch-black as its predecessor, but had a small cracked window, pooling into the room the sun's warm rays. Allen cringed and pulled back his hands to cover his eyes. They had been unprepared for the sudden change in lighting and it felt as though someone had just snuck up and taken a picture with a flash camera. Once his eyes were adjusted Allen lowered his hands back onto the floor and saw the room in a new light. And it was not pretty.

The walls were caked with mold and secreted a pungent dampness (for once, Allen was glad his shot sinuses had inhibited his sense of smell), it looked as though they had been painted once but now the color was chipped and faded into a dull brown. There were a couple of pieces of broken furniture in the room- a toppled chair missing a leg here, a grandfather clock there on its side with the clock face punched in and the wood long since rotten. The worst part was what was littering the room. It wasn't the average day junk and trash that most basements held. The room was like a twisted medieval cellar that contained the putrid skeletal remains of human beings.

All the bones were small and were dressed in faded rags. A great number of the rags had splotches of dark red on them- it was blood, blood that had dried a long time ago. The blood probably came from the wounds that ended up killing the people back when they were alive. Allen moved closer to inspect one of skeletons that had caught his attention.

The bones belonged to a young female, by the looks of the skeleton's pelvis. Unlike the other skeletons there were no blood stains on her clothes. Her arms were shielding her head and her legs were brought up into a fetal position. Several other bones, especially on her back, were either fractured or broken. It looked as though she had been beaten and stomped on to death. And this girl, like all the others in the room, looked as if she had died at a very young age.

Allen felt something tug at his heart. These were children, beaten and stabbed to death then thrown into this room to be left to rot. There were no tombstones, markers, or anything to signify that someone had moved onto the next life. Only small bodies, now skeletons, tossed and stacked onto each other. They were anonymous and forgotten. It made Allen sick to his stomach to think about the type of person who could have done such a thing. Allen clasped his hands together to murmur a belated prayer for the deceased.

When Allen finished praying he found himself imbued with newfound strength and energy. All the aches and pains in his tired body didn't hurt or matter anymore. He had spent enough time moping in the dark and it was high time to ditch those heavy shackles and get back to Tune and Kanda. Allen had a hunch that the monster's attack wasn't just a random act of violence and that the thing wasn't going to just stop at him. And there was also the possibility that his attacker and Ekaterina were connected, everything see all too coincidental from the start now that Allen thought about it. The chances of someone finding you carrying an unconscious comrade with your medic/guide in the middle of the Russian wilderness during a snowstorm, for Pete's sake, well...it was pretty impossible.

If Allen's assumptions were correct then Kanda and Tune were in some deep shit- if they weren't already.

XDXDXD

_Cheylabinsk, Russia_

_Ekaterina's POV_

The first thing that I thought of when I saw these three was that they were a completely and utterly pathetic group of idiots. I was doubtful that these people were even the fabled exorcists I had heard so much about from Ms. Perovskaya. One of them was a grumpy old man trapped in a teenager's body who did not get along with the bizarre-looking female of the group. Both were too hotheaded and stubborn for their own good and listening to their arguments made me feel like blasting them with five thousand volts of electricity just to make them shut up. The last one, a finder named Tune, was a purebred weakling, but the only one with common sense in the dumbass trio, who tried to no avail to get the two exorcists to stop fighting. They wouldn't last a week in Russia, much less in the Siberian wilderness where winter was the only season throughout the year.

But no matter, the friction between the three just made my job much easier.

Mother and I had already succeeded in the initial part of our plan- getting them to trust us. It wasn't that hard honestly. I was expecting a bit more of a challenge this time. I had simply approached the girl and finder in the peak of the blizzard they were attempting to brave. Interestingly, the black-haired exorcist was out cold and being piggy-backed by the person he had spent most of his time in Russia bickering with. I came forward and offered some assistance. They would have been fools to turn the offer down. The girl already had a cold that was steadily worsening as she spent more and more time in the cold and the finder had a mild case of frostbite going on. Pitiful.

I took them back to one of the houses in Chelyabinsk (the information I had intercepted said that their destination was, in fact, Chelyabinsk so I further sowed the seed of false trust by bringing them to the place they wanted to be most) and showed them some care and hospitality. (I even treated the finder's frostbite and gave the mean exorcist some medicine to break his fever. The other one's sickness was a bit too much for the cheap OTC drugs I had 'liberated' from the nearby pharmacy to cure but there was nothing I could do about that)

The three stayed under our little umbrella of kindness for a full twenty-four hours before I deemed it was time for phase two of the plan- transport them from the villa in Chelyabinsk over to our base in St. Petersburg. The base was an abandoned Orthodox church that had once been occupied by Mrs. Perovskaya and her students until her arrest in 1874.

When it was time to move I sent Mother to take care of the girl while I handled the other two. There wasn't enough time to toy around with them and I had to get the job done quickly so two thin pieces of copper and some good old fashioned electrocution to send them to nighty-night as I hog-tied the other two and waited for Mother. It wasn't long before she came back downstairs with an unconscious female exorcist slung over her shoulders. I smiled and we brought all three of them outside where the stars were just starting to appear in the wake of the sunset.

About two hundred feet from the small mansion was a small deserted mine that, back in the old days, had been used to mine for metal ore for the automatic and mass destruction weapons in World War I. Now it was just a overlooked part of Chelyabinsk that people were advised not to go near because it was deemed 'structurally unstable'. Haha, bullshit. The mine had been renovated to become part of an intricate system of underground pathways and automated transportation for the Royal family if they ever needed a quick escape. However the network was hardly ever used by the actual Royalty and also became disregarded by them as well as more costly and convoluted ways of protecting the Crown were created.

However the covert labyrinth of escape routes and short cuts were not forgotten by other areas of Russian public. Specifically those affiliated with illegal groups, material and human trafficking organizations, or as Mrs. Perovskaya and her colleagues had been a part of, revolutionary circles. I just used the old rails as a means of moving prospects to our base. All it took was some electricity to turn the discarded mining carts into a mock-subway system.

I dumped the three into the cart and hopped in as well while Mother juiced the rusted rails with power to get them moving. It would take at least thirty-one hours to travel by 'train' from Cheylabinsk to St. Petersburg. Mother dissipated into the air as I bundled up on the opposite side facing the exorcists and their finder. The cart was moving quickly and starting to gain speed, the earthy smell of the mine beginning to envelope me.

'It's going to be a long trip..' I thought to myself as I closed my eyes and let sleep come to me for the first time in three days.

XDXDXD

_St. Petersburg, Russia_

When I awoke, the cart had stopped and parked itself to stop at the entrance of yet another abandoned mine, but this time in St. Petersburg. The stars were gone and had been replaced by the sun. I'd slept the entire ride and my body felt stiff was difficult to move. I shook off the dull aches as I crept out of the cart. I called out to Mother and she quickly materialized next to me and help to carry the three (still unconscious, I'd loaded them all full of electricity back there and they'd have to have skin as thick as an elephant to bounce back from that) Black Order members into the church.

The church was still a good half-mile away but I didn't mind the walk. This part of Russia was still covered in snow but the air was much more crisp and refreshing to breathe in. There were spots were grass, dull green grass but grass nonetheless, poking out of the snow and reminding me of spring coming to bring life back into frozen wasteland. A poetic and nice thought to fancy, but in the end it was pointless to observe such an ideology. Thinking doesn't do anything.

Action does.

XDXDXD

Like the mines, Mother and I had renovated the church to best suit our operations as well. The outside appearance remained the same, as we wouldn't want anyone to get suspicious and the bulk of our changes were made on the inside. The church was rectangular at the base, with the building consisting of four rooms. The first room was the largest, taking up half the church, which was understandable since it was the room that the Sunday churchgoers would occupy to pray, gather, and such. The other three rooms were equal in size and space and stood behind the main room. One of them was the pastor's personal office, the middle room was a miniature library filled with religious doctrines, and the last room was storage. This building, like any other, had a basement as its foundation and the door the basement was hidden in the storage but I didn't like to go there much.

The main room served as our center of operations, it still kept the numerous pews and such but the altar had been knocked out and replaced with a metal workbench. Off to the side were an assortment of knives, swords, scalpels, and other instruments of 'slicing'. I had also draped several copper wires on the walls and ceilings, not for decoration but for combat. It wasn't impossible for me to create copper out of thin air but having some sort of basis made things much easier on my body.

Mother brought Kanda, Allen, and Tune into the main room and laid them on the pews while I decided what method would be best to go about things. This time was a bit different since the Black Order had actually sent _two_ exorcists instead of one. Things could become more difficult later on if something went wrong. I ended up going with my initial strategy, to extract the male exorcist's Innocence first.

I had to admit, while spying on the three in the blizzard I was mildly impressed by the girl's Innocence when she saved the finder from falling through the ice. Her Innocence was not like any other Parasitic-types I'd come across before and I sensed a strange energy coming from her as well. But because of her little 'rescue', the girl came down with a nasty cold and killing the sick one first didn't sit well with me. I still had my own ethics.

Mother took the girl down to the basement and locked her up there until we needed her. Tune was placed in the pastor's office (now just a room full of boxes). I laid Kanda down on the workbench and locked both his wrists and ankles down. I unbuttoned the top half of his exorcist jacket and bent down to listen to his heart to give a rough diagnosis of his health. Alive, steady heart rate, currently in minor comatose and should come to in another hour, maybe less. Surprisingly there no traces of injury besides that. After being electrocuted his skin was fine and the spot where I had sent the wire through him was healed up. I suspected this might have to do with the peculiar tattoo on his chest but wrote this off as an insignificant anomaly. Whatever was healing him, it wasn't going to be of much help when he was dead.

I then took the sword attached to the hilt at his side, I figured this was his Equipment-type Innocence. If extracting Innocence from exorcists was as simple as taking a sword away, it would sure make my job a lot easier. But unfortunately, removing Innocence either required some sort of special power or brute force. And since I didn't have the former, only brute force, there was going to be a lot of pain later in store for Kanda. Kanda was lucky though, he wouldn't have to lose any limbs to have his Innocence taken away but like with all the others before him. I'd just have to drive several thousand volts of electricity into him to get him closest the death as possible.

When carriers of Innocence are at a 'near-death' situation (like having every bone in your body systematically smashed or as Kanda's case would be, pumped with enough raw energy to pop him like a balloon) they are at both their strongest and their weakest. Strength-wise, their power is immeasurable but their Innocence is also very unstable since most of its powers are going to its vessel, the Innocence itself is very vulnerable and can, if done right, ripped out and devoured. The latter would be done by Mother, of course. Innocence would just give me an upset stomach.

I hid Kanda's sword in the storage room, sticking the sword in an umbrella holder. All it was right now was just fifty percent of the actual Innocence, hollow even. The real stuff was a part of Kanda and it was going to take a while to generate enough energy to control that much electricity at one time so I retired to the library (which I had refurbished into my own bedroom) to take a nap. Mother snuck in before I fell asleep to give me a status report, I nodded and again she disappeared into the air around me. I shut my eyes and prepared to have the same dream I've been having for the past eight years.

XDXDXD

_"Did you hear? The entire west side of Novogornyy came down with typhoid fever. Everyone there is sick. The town council is thinking of quarantining everyone sick." _

_"Mm. The wells there are disgusting and it doesn't help that they're just dumping their trash into the nearby streams and ponds. Old habits die hard, I suppose. And you're wrong about 'everyone' on the west being sick."_

_"Huh? Oh. Her. Well that girl is a freak of nature. Her entire family has either already died of the fever or is on the verge of dying. I think the government should just take her away already. It's not normal and she's known as the witch of the town. Further poisoning the unfortunate village."_

_They're talking about me again. I wonder if they realize the small child using soggy newspapers as a blanket is the 'witch' they're gossiping about. My body may not be like everyone else but that doesn't mean my feelings or my heart are any different._

_"You women should behave more as you like everyone to perceive you as- a lady. It's very unladylike to speak about someone so rudely when they are standing right in front of you. Look." _

_Wait, she can actually see me? Or rather, she would actually notice me? Who is this woman..?_

_"Ah? Oh my goodness, it really is her. Uh...um, s-sorry...please don't curse us...young...miss..." one of the women says to me, still refusing to look me in the eye as she apologizes. I only blink._

_"You're one to talk, Sophia. With your nose always stuck in a book of politics or something. What are you trying to be? An intelligentsia? What would your mother say.." the other woman retorts. I squirm a little bit when I hear the word 'intelligentsia', my family wasn't fond of the intelligentsia at all. Most Russians have very mixed feelings about them._

_"She would say that she's glad I'm attempting to educate myself rather than make useless prattle about the tribulations of the less fortunate. Speaking of which, Argipina, how's your husband's mistress?" The woman's face turns bright red and she murmurs something to her friend then they leave, tossing me a sour look over their shoulder. I shrug it off and shrink up against the wall even more so._

_The lady that stood up for me hasn't left yet. She just stands above me, eyeing my movements. I feel like an animal being observed to decide whether or not to be slaughtered for meat. I wish she would just leave me alone and walk away like everyone else._

_Finally she speaks._

_"Young girl, are you truly the child that everyone have been speaking about? The one who doesn't get sick, doesn't need food or water? Who doesn't grow older?" she asked, a hint of excitement in her voice. I shrug. Everything but the last part she said was true. I do grow older, but my body doesn't. I'm eight now. I was the same size and weight as I was when I was six. _

_She claps her hands together to rub them together and shivers. Clearly she's not used to being standstill in the snow for too long. A glaring sign she comes from a well-to-do family. _

_"Well, you certainly are a miracle, aren't you?" A miracle? That's the first time I've heard that one. Usually it's 'witch', or 'demon', or 'thing'. I begin to wonder if she's a government official here to take me away. I've had run-ins with those people, they chase me and chase me but I always get away. I think I'm starting to get tired of running now._

_"Tell me, young lady. Do you have an open mind? Do you accept tradition and word of mouth as law or do you question it? Do you want something to change?" Change..? Yes. I would have liked to change the course of my life. I would have liked to change the deaths of everyone in my family. I would have liked to change how my family treated me._

_I nod._

_"Then will you come with me to unravel the history of Russia? Will you partake the shaping of a new world? Will you make a choice for yourself?" She asks a lot of questions but I like them. They flow from her tongue like sweet treats, they're things I've never heard before. I nod again and she smiles, closing her eyes in the gesture and allowing more snowflakes to collect on her lashes. She's really pretty._

_"Well then, my name is Sophia Perovskaya. Would you like to join me for class today? I'm sure you'll like it very much." She offers her hand out to me and I take it. I'm kind of swept up in her magical words and can't really think straight, all I know is her hand is really warm and I'm not sitting beside a trashcan with wet paper as a blanket anymore._

_XDXDXD_

_Ms. Perovskaya is a teacher, she takes me to a small church in St. Petersburg where she teaches. It's a long trip from here to St. Petersburg; there's a lot of walking and riding on trains, but Ms. Perovskaya holds my hand the entire time. I'm not sure why. Next to her, surely people can tell I'm a street urchin. People throw her strange looks, wondering why she would bother with a child like me and I don't blame them. I'm curious as well. I don't care much for what other people think but Ms. Perovskaya takes it to a new level. Everyone else's words and looks seem to bounce off her. Thick skin, I suppose?_

_Her class is filled mostly with children. Strangely they all look somewhat similar to me, picked off from the streets. The good thing about this is that they don't look down on me or anything. I doubt they've even heard the rumors about me. It's refreshing. The collective attention of the children is focused on Ms. Perovskaya from the moment she steps in the room to the moment she leaves it. I soon learn why. _

_Ms. Perovskaya mostly teaches us in lectures, but her lectures are so carefully crafted and intriguing it leaves my mind spinning. She speaks the same way as she did when I first met her. All the words that leave her mouth are dipped in honey and given to us and we eat it up. She lectures about politics and Russian history and tells us things we've never heard before. Ms. Perovskaya sometimes speaks about intelligentsia._

_"The intelligentsia, are a group of people who think differently from other people. They ponder and muse about everything from culture to independence. They strive to educate themselves. I want you all to have the qualities of an intelligentsia. For after the revolution, they shall be the ones who will lead the country."_

_Someone raises their hand. "Ms. Perovskaya, what do you mean by revolution?"_

_Ms. Perovskaya smiles. "Of the intelligentsia there are many different sects who have very different ideas of which direction Mother Russia should take. One of those sects were the Zemlya i volya who wanted social revolution and a populist government. Inside that group formed two circles of people with opposing thoughts. A schism occured that cause the Zemlya i volya to split into two entirely different groups, the Narodnaya Volya and the Chernyi Peredel._

_"The latter of the two were against political struggle and conspiracy and are of less importance compared to the Narodnaya Volya. Narodnaya Volya, or the People's Will, fight for social and political reform using any means possible. The current issue they are working on is Tsar Alexander II.."_

_Again the same student raises their hand to ask another question. "Are you a member of the Narodnaya Volya, Ms. Perovskaya?"_

_And again Ms. Perovskaya smiles but this time does not answer._

XDXDXD

The loud clang of something hitting against against metal snapped me out of my dream. I bolted up from my bed and tried to stand up but I almost toppled over when I briefly blacked out. Shit, had I over slept? While I collected myself, I sent Mother out to see what was going on.

XDXDXD

_Allen's POV_

Getting rid of the iron cuffs was surprisingly easy. The metal was rusted and a quick slice from Crown Clown was more than enough to free me. When I finally managed to find the door out of the basement, I found myself in a storage room. I hauled myself up and over the trap door and closed it. I still had no clue where the hell I was but there was no time to ponder about that right now. I had to focus on getting back to Tune and Kanda. In the room there was a metal canister with several umbrella stuffed in it and strangely, Mugen as well. I figured it might be a good idea to keep the katana around and return it to Kanda whenever I met up with him so I took it with me. There were also a ring of keys hanging on the wall which I took as well, guessing they would come in handy later. Luckily, the exit to the storage room was much easier to find compared to the basement's hidden door.

Outside of the storage room was a hallway. On my side there were two other doors and and on the other side was one large doorway in the middle. I decided to go with the doorway.

...A church? What the...wait, is that Kanda? Strapped onto a metal bench? With his Exorcist coat open?

'...Don't think about it, Allen. Just move.' I thought to myself as I ran over to the workbench. Yep, that was most definitely Kanda. I wasn't sure _why_ he was chained down but I worked on getting the cuffs off. Unlike my own shoddy and rusted up chains, Kanda's were reinforced and well-maintained. Edge End could probably break them but something told me that making any loud noises right now wouldn't be a good idea. I recalled the ring of kings I had swiped and did a mental facepalm. One of the keys looked like they would fit and fortunately it did, unlocking the cuffs on Kanda's ankles. But the handcuffs on Kanda's wrists were a different story.

The handcuffs were held parallel to Kanda's head and his arms were bent so his wrists could be chained down. The handcuff's keyhole was turned in the direction closest to Kanda so I couldn't open them from anywhere unless...I was actually _on top_ of Kanda. Ehh...maybe I should just leave him here...gah! Can't do that! Can't leave fellow comrade (even if they don't treat you like a comrade..) chained to a...table. Well...uh, he's asleep right now so he'll never know that I had to...top him...

I lifted myself onto the table and crawled over Kanda, sitting with my legs spread on either side on him. Ugh, this would really help if I had pants on. My face was burning red as I fiddled with the keys, trying to find the right one that would fit. To my utter and total dismay, I heard a groan coming from below me. It was Kanda, he was awake. Letting out a slur of curses in my head, I worked even faster, searching like mad to find the correct key. None of them fit. What the fuc-!

"..The hell. What's on...Moyashi?" Kanda grumbled, squinting up at me. I was silent, too horrified at my current position to say anything. Once he really came to, his eyes widened. I quickly slapped my hand over his mouth to muffle his loud, freaked-out curses. Quiet is good and better safe than sorry. When Kanda was done, I removed my hand.

"Shh! Okay, I know things don't look...good, right now. But, please, please keep your voice down. I'm still not sure where we are or who brought us here but it's better that they don't know we're awake and trying to escape. ...Kanda? Are you alright?" I whispered. Kanda's head was turned away from me right now, his eyes glaring into the wall and refusing to meet me. His face was red too, but that was understandable. My face still felt like a radiator.

"Your shirt..." he said. I looked down at my chest. The camisole top of the nightgown had folded out due to my lack of a large chest. Augh...kill me now. I had already straddled Kanda and now, flashed my chest at him. Just take me now, God. I immediately tugged the cami up and began muttering an inaudible rant of embarrassment.

"I'm...I'm sorry about that..." I murmured, face even more on fire than before. Kanda cleared his throat softly and nodded.

"Oi. Aren't you going get these things off me?" he asked, motioned at the cuffs on his wrists.

"I tried but none of the keys will fit." He frowned.

"Your hand, is it broken?" I glanced at my right hand which was swollen and still hurt like hell. I nodded. "But your other one, the one with the Innocence is fine, right?" Again I nodded. "Then why don't you just use Crown Clown to them off?" his voice seemed to gain a level of frustration. This time it was my turn to frown.

"I _can't_ because it'll cause too much noise and you might get hurt!" I barked back quietly. Kanda scowled at me.

"I don't care if it hurts, Moyashi! I just wanna be able to sit up already." I sighed and adjusted myself to activate my Innocence. I raised Crown Clown over my head.

"You ready?" I asked. Kanda che'd and nodded. I quickly swiped one of my 'claws' over the left cuff then the right. A loud clank resounded from them as them snapped apart. Crap...maybe no one heard that. Kanda groaned as he rubbed his sore wrists and sat up. He stared at me and I blinked back in response.

"You can get off me already." he said. My eyes went wide as I remembered who I was sitting on. I hopped off Kanda and onto the floor, this time clutching my skirt and top for extra security. No more accidental flashing. Kanda rolled off the table and grabbed his sword from the ground where I had laid it. He took off his Exorcist jacket and tossed it to me. I barely caught the heavy coat. "Put it on." Kanda said. I clumsily pulled my arms through the long sleeves heaved the coat over my small shoulders before murmuring a quiet thanks. My face was still red.

Suddenly Kanda unsheathed his katana, stepping in front of me and assuming a defensive position. I looked over his shoulders to see what was the matter. My breath hitched, it was the machine-like monster that had attacked me before. The air started to vibrate with a warm heat. I looked up, hundreds of copper wires hung from the ceiling, all buzzing with hot electricity. I reactivated Crown Clown and got ready to fight. I had a score to settle with that freakish thing.

The air quieted again as someone appeared from the doorway beside the monster. It was her, Ekaterina. My assumptions had been correct, she was behind this all. The young girl who had come to our rescue stood before us dressed in black, her blue eyes cooly observing Kanda and I.

"You found your way out, I see." she said, speaking to us both. Kanda was silent, me not so much.

"Why?" I asked. I wanted to cut to the chase. Ekaterina gave a small smirk. I went on, "Why did you do all this?" She stepped forward, a copper spear materializing in her hand. Kanda tensed up.

"That..." The machine rushed towards me, its arm formed into a sharp edge. Before I could react, Kanda side-stepped and blocked the edge from hitting me in just the nick of time. "Is none of your concern." Ekaterina finished, sending several razor wires down at me, I jumped back, narrowly dodging the would-be-fatal hit. Ekaterina smirked again, seemingly happy that I had escaped her sneak attack. Kanda looked at me over his shoulder, still busying fending off Ekaterina's accomplice.

"Moyashi, find Tune and get the hell out of here." Kanda growled. In a flash, Ekaterina appeared in front of me and roundhouse-kicked me in the side, propelling me into the church pews. Argh...that hurt...a lot. I touched the place where Ekaterina had kicked me, the skin was a bit burnt. She had charged her kick with electricity and sent me into a crumpled heap of broken benches and had also given me a minor burn. Obviously Ekaterina's 'cute little girl' act was a steaming pile of bull. The girl was lethal. With a groan I heaved myself up, Crown Clown quickly patching up the singe and tear in my cloak. Ekaterina grinned at me, reforging the copper spear in her hand into a long dagger and stepping towards me.

XDXDXD

_Kanda's POV_

Damn, this thing was tough. The monster was continuously forcing me into a defensive position, constantly swinging its cleaver-like limbs at me. I blocked each swipe with ease but I had no time to make a counterattack before it would swing its knife-like arms down on me again. The monster finally stopped its barrage of attacks and jumped a few feet back to get away from me. Smart move, but I was a little worn out as well from blocking its attacks to counter. Its arms felt like they each weighed thirty pounds. I glanced behind myself for a second to see how the moyashi was doing. He and the brat seemed to be in somewhat of a standoff. The moyashi had his 'claws' out and was waiting for the other to strike. Ekaterina had a big dagger in tow and was quietly formulating her attack. The entire room was buzzing with electricity coming from the wires above us, I assumed the girl and her little 'friend' were the cause.

I went back to glaring at the metal freakshow in front of me. It was still standing there motionless. My guess was that it was receiving its orders from the girl and if that was true all the moyashi had to do was take her out. But then came the problem, the enemy was a girl..._a ten-year old girl_. The beansprout would probably have a difficult time fighting her just for that reason. Beating up a little girl isn't okay to the beansprout, even if she and her buddy kidnapped you and locked you up in a church in God knows where. I don't like kids so I was perfectly fine dealing with this creep but I hoped the moyashi suck up his 'nice guy-ness' and find it in him to KO the kid before this became a big problem.

Finally the thing moved, its arms had turned into big long chains and were swinging quite ominously at me. Shit, Skinn Bolic all over again. Suddenly one of the chains came flying at me, I blocked it but the chain took on a life of its own and wrapped around my blade then my hand. I cursed as the other chain-arm flew forward and wrapped itself around my ankle, throwing me off balance and causing me to fall onto the floor. But before I could fall on my ass, the chains tightened and monster spun itself around. The chains yanked me up and into the air like a ragdoll, tossing me through a stain glass window. The colored glass shattered and I felt several broken pieces cut me all around. Again, I cursed like a sailor as I fell on my ass onto the ground, the snow had cushioned some of the impact but it still hurt like hell though. With great difficultly, I maneuvered Mugen around and broke the chains binding my arm and leg. The smashed chains retracted back and machine leapt out the window to face me.

"Nigentou.." I muttered, pulling out my scabbard as a coat of energy surrounded it and Mugen as well. The monster imitated me, shaping its arms into long blades then conducting electricity into them. I smirked, the thing could create as many knock-offs of Mugen's abilities as it wanted, I was still going to beat the living shit out of it later on. I charged forward and jumped up when I came close enough to the monster, both energy blades above my head. The machine raised its own blades up to protect itself as I struck down at its head, slashing it eight consecutive times.

"Hakka Tourou!"

That was when Kanda heard a scream resound from the church and the crackle of electricity.

XDXDXD

_Normal POV_

"Kanda!" Allen cried as he watched his comrade get thrown out the window. With a hum of gears and electricity the machine followed Kanda out the window, pulling backs its chains. Ekaterina grunted, now that the two were separated it'd be much easier to deal with them. Mother could handle the boy and she would take care of the girl.

"You should worry less about your friend and more about yourself." Ekaterina said, flashing behind Allen to slash at his back. This time Allen was prepared. He whipped around and blocked the swipe with his claws, easily overpowering the smaller girl and pushing her away. Ekaterina frowned. So electricity had no effect on the girl's deformed arm, huh? No matter, she would simply attack the human areas of her body then. Ekaterina lumped a bunch of the wires above Allen into metal stalactites then with a swing of her arm, sent the tapered chunks of metal falling down towards Allen. The exorcist looked up and drew a cross in the air with his left hand, shattering the copper stalactites in midair.

Allen half-smiled, another attack avoided but his smile faltered when he saw Ekaterina smirking. That was never a good thing. Allen pulled at his cloak, trying to get it to cover himself when he heard a familiar buzz resound from above him. In a split second, the air burned hotly with electricity then the currents exploded, electrocuting him.

Ekaterina stood off to the side, watching the girl scream as she absorbed all the raw energy into her body. As far as she knew this exorcist did not have the rate of regeneration the other one did. This attack would be more than enough to finish her off. She had made the mistake of breaking the copper stalactites earlier before. The copper had broken and splintered in the air, but it was still copper and therefore still had its conductive qualities. Ekaterina looked out the broken window. If Mother finished up with Kanda in time they could snag the Innocence from both of them then have _two_ pieces of Innocence to give to the Earl. Maybe today was her lucky day after all.

"Ah..." Ekaterina stiffened. Impossible. There was no way she could have...shit! Two white spikes zoomed towards me, Ekaterina clumsily dodged the attack and good thing too, the spikes had imbedded themselves deep in the church's wooden floor. They retracted as quickly as they came, Ekaterina gasped as Allen stood up from the wreckage. Only the exorcist didn't look like herself. No, the upper half of her face was covered by the silver masquerade mask that had been attached to the cowl of her cloak. Her body was being held up by white ribbons coming from the cloak as well. It didn't seem like Allen was even conscious. Was the Innocence moving on its own?

Allen rushed forth in Ekaterina's direction and slashed at her with his left hand. Ekaterina did a somersault to evade the attack but Allen came forward and slashed at her again. 'Damn!' Ekaterina thought, forming a shield above her to block the hit. Allen's claws easily cut through the shoddily prepared copper and came at her again. Ekaterina scrambled to flash herself farther away from the exorcist. Like with everything else, Ekaterina relied on her ability to use copper to control and conduct electricity. She had some copper in the soles of her feet and used electricity to push her forward. It was a simple trick that Allen hadn't been able to see through at first but now that his Innocence was in control he was predicting her next position and beating her to it. Ekaterina felt herself trip on a piece of wood and cursed before Allen kicked her in the stomach.

"Ow.." Ekaterina moaned, she had landed on a pew but not with enough force to break it. Ekaterina clambered up, using the back of the pew for support. She held her waist gingerly, some of her ribs felt like they were broken. Allen stared at Ekaterina with indifference, watching her create another copper dagger. Ekaterina took another deep breath then flashed behind Allen to cut his throat, she was getting tired fast and Mother still hadn't come back from her battle with Kanda. Allen foresaw Ekaterina's attack and grabbed her hand as she was just about to cut him. He twisted her hand sideways, forcing Ekaterina to drop the dagger in pain. Ekaterina bit back a cry of pain, Allen was breaking her wrist. He was forcing her down to the ground in submission. Dammit this wasn't has it was supposed to go! With last bit of her concentration, Ekaterina forged a small knuckle duster on her free hand and swung at Allen's face with all her might.

Allen stopped twisting Ekaterina's hand when she punched him across the face with the knuckle duster. He dropped Ekaterina's wrist and the girl quickly wriggled away, distancing herself from the exorcist. Ekaterina briskly wiped off the tears of pain in corners of her eyes, her wrist ached and her abdomen hurt like crazy. She tried to send a call of help to Mother but out of the blue, the exorcist appeared in front of her and seized a hold of her neck with her right hand, her _broken_ hand. (But then again, what did the Innocence care if its carrier's hand was broken?) Allen dug his nails into the girls neck and began squeezing the life out of her. But strangely, Ekaterina was stiff as a board and her face was blanched.

'No, no, no, no!' she screamed in her head. Someone was touching it. They were touching her mark! No!

Ekaterina let out a feral shriek as metal claws formed on her fingertips. She used them to peel Allen's hand off her neck and one it was gone, Ekaterina turned the claws into a knife and Allen in the arm with it.

"GET AWAY FROM ME!" she cried once the knife was jammed into Allen's arm. Allen was frozen in place, not yet realizing he'd just been stabbed. Crown Clown had retreated and something was taking ahold of his mind. A memory. But not one belonging to him. It was...Ekaterina's?

XDXDXD

_"Ohoho...what's this? Another lost soul in pain and misery?" said the Earl, looking down at the small child dressed only in tattered hand-me-downs huddled up against the grey tombstone. The Earl smiled slightly to himself, even though no one would be able to tell with his face contorted into that constant demented grin, another easy prey._

_"Tell me, miserable child, have you lost someone you care dearly for?" he asked. The child had been crying before but immediately stopped upon hearing the Earl's question and stared up at him. For a brief moment, the Earl was surprised by the unfeeling emptiness in the child's eyes. There was no feeling or sadness- only a hollow emptiness. He waited patiently for an answer._

_"How...can I lose someone...when I have never had ANYONE." the child spoke softly but there was an underlying angriness in the words as well. The Earl was silent for a moment then suddenly started laughing merrily. Oh yes, he had felt it before...this one was different all right._

_"AHAHAH. My dear, dear, broken child...you are indeed different. And I like that. So I offer you this...how would you like to make a deal with the devil, hm?"_

_The child looked up, the yellow moom illuminating her face. It was Ekaterina. The Earl continued, explaining his offer. _

_"See, my dear. You're special, I'm sure you know that, but do you know why? You carry Innocence inside of you! But it's not the kind that you can fight or defend yourself with. No, no. It's hidden deep inside your body and it's everywhere. It keeps you alive and is the reason why you can't die." The Earl eyed the 'not-yet healed' cuts on her wrist. They went in deep and if it had been anyone else, the person would have been dead a long while ago. But not her. The Earl chuckled, the girl was listening intently to what he had to say. Good. But then she spoke. _

_"Then...take it out. Take it out! Take it out! TAKE IT OUT!" she screamed, clutching at his jacket, groveling and crying in a most pitiful manner. The Earl gave her sharp look. Ekaterina froze and moved back a bit. Please with her obedience, the Earl's expression softened._

_"I cannot take the Innocence away without killing you." The Earl replied. 'Besides, you've already harmed yourself so much that the moment I did all your self-inflicted wounds and injuries would come back in a matter of seconds. You'd be a pile of rotting flesh the moment the Innocence left you.' Ekaterina looked like she wanted to say something but stopped herself. The Earl was scary.. "Besides, I could use a little girl like you..." the Earl drawled. He lifted up his hand, in it a black orb appeared. The orb began to shrink itself, getting smaller and smaller until it was a sphere no bigger than centimeter in diameter. It was Dark Matter, solidified and formed into a dense ball the size of a pill, not that the girl would know but.._

_"Here. Swallow it." The Earl said, handing the 'pill' to Ekaterina. She looked at the Earl suspiciously. "It'll force back some of your Innocence's abilities and give you some special powers as well." That was all he needed to say before the girl took the pill and swallowed it in one fluid motion. If it would take some of 'those' powers away then it was worth it. _

_"..!" Ekaterina felt a burning sensation in the back of her neck. It hurt. It hurt. Was this part of the process? Ekaterina held back a scream. It felt like someone was branding her with a hot metal tong. A few seconds later the pain dissipated, leaving a single black star on the back of her neck. The Earl smirked. Just as he had predicted. The girl's Innocence was constantly repairing her body and even with something as toxic as Dark Matter in her, the Innocence would counteract it. The Dark Matter he had given her had one ability only and that was to control the element of copper. If she was smart the girl would know how to use the ability to her advantage. _

_"Listen, child. My gift to you is not free. I need something from you in return." Ekaterina shivered, the scary man's eyes were dark again._

_"W-what do you want?" she asked shakily. The Earl tilted his head playfully._

_"I want you to hunt the Innocence. Find the people that carry it within them and rip it out. Then destroy it. This should help you with the last part." he snapped in fingers and Level 0 akuma, still in its template, appeared beside him. "Use this to your benefit. But from today until you die, this is your mission and your purpose."_

* * *

Explanation/Translation

(all info is taken from Wikipedia and is historically accurate)

Narodnaya Volya- (The People's Will) a famous Russian terrorist group who are most famous for the assassination of tsar Alexander II in 1988. Highly organized and well hidden and dispersed throughout Russia. Used propaganda and terrorist tactics as their main use of means. All members were found and arrested after the successful assassination attempt.

Chernyi Peredel- (The Black Partition) another Russian revolutionary group active around the same time as the Narodnaya Volya. Chiefly used propaganda. Derived from the same original revolutionary circle as the Narodnaya Volya as well.

Zemlya i volya- (Land and Liberty) a revolutionary circle founded by several important intelligentsia. Later split into two different groups because of difference in belief and means.

Intelligentsia- people who valued knowledge, self education, had a strong set of morals/ethics, etc. Commonly associated with Russian intelligentsia.

Sophia Perovskaya- (1853-81) A member of the Narodnaya Volya and famous for being the first female in Russia to be executed with connections to a political trial. Ran several anti-tsarist propaganda-based apartments in St. Petersburg. Helped orchestrate the assassination of Alexander II and was soon apprehended and put to trial where she was found guilty and executed.

K/N- If you can't tell, the Kitsune is quite the history buff. She spent days looking up articles on her Mac and writing up the chapter as she read. ...What a strange place to end the chapter. Oh well. The Kitsune told me to clear some things up. Tune is not dead, it's just in the original rendering of chapter five he appeared in the second half of the draft so you'll have to wait till chapter six to see what happens to him. Yes, the moyashi's Crown Clown does go berserk and acts without consent from the sprout when he's either knocked out or too beat to move on his own. Check the manga or the DGM wiki for confirmation. Ekat's Innocence is the ability to maintain and preserve its carrier regardless of any damage she sustains, in short its keeps a perfect homeostasis 24/7. Don't ask how. It's Innocence.

...Good God, I'm grateful the moyashi didn't sit anywhere _lower_ on me...-.-U Crisis averted. For now.

I'm getting tired of talking. Here's your omake for any of you interested fangirls. And it's in-universe and very much made of crack. (Plus a good 3/4s of it is dialogue..but interesting dialogue) You've been warned.

XDXDXD

**Omake**

_Black Order HQ- Cafeteria _

"What? No way! That's total BS, Allen. We need a second opinion." Lavi said, wheeling around to face Kanda's back as the samurai ate his lunch. (Soba, of course) He held two thin novels up for Kanda to see before demanding him to pick which one was better. "What say Yuu?" he asked, snickering a bit at his own pun. 'Heheh, I'm so punny...'

Kanda rolled his eyes before pointing to the one on the right, causing Lavi to do a victory fist pump and Allen to drop his jaw. 'WHAT? I didn't think Kanda would...' Allen thought. The small exorcist glared at the gloating redhead as he shoved the 'winning' novel all up in his face, shouting "HAH! Suck on that, Allen! Kanda picked mine. Ha-haha-ha-ha!" Allen had had it. He grabbed the book and smacked Lavi upside the head with it. Kanda smirked a bit at this. He found it quite amusing to see the baka usagi get bitchslapped with a _tankobon of Bleach_.

"Shut up! Gah! You two," Allen paused to glare at both Lavi and Kanda. "You two, both don't good taste in manga! One Piece is clearly the better series!" Lavi snorted. He went on. "Plus, Luffy could _so_ wipe that strawberry-scented pretty boy across the floor!" Lavi nearly choked on his own spit.

"Uh, hell to the no! First off, his name is freakin' Ichigo Kurosaki! And he owns. At everything. Including asskickery. So no, the amazing rubber band cannot beat Ichigo. Ever." Allen's eye twitched.

"Psh. What the hell's so great about that oversized sword, huh? All it's good for is blindly swinging away at enemies." Allen glared at Lavi. "It's Monkey D. Luffy, idiot. Way more original than Mister Strawberry's.."

"Oh yeah, like no parent has ever given their kid a weirdass name? There's nothing original about pirates anymore, Allen." Lavi retorted.

"And shonen manga with katanas as the main weapon are?" Allen glanced over at Kanda. "Oi, Bakanda, is it just me or is every Japanese sword always a flippin' _katana_. I mean, that's the type of sword Mugen is, right?" Kanda scowled.

"It used to be a chokuto...but it got reforged into a katana. Why the hell are you asking me this? It's not my fault that every manga seems to feature a katana above any other sharp object." He said before going back to his soba. Lavi grunted.

"Whatever. Bleach is still better." Lavi stated. Allen shook his head.

"Nope, One Piece has been around much longer. Seniority." Lavi waved his hands nonchalantly.

"Just means it's an old-timer that needs to step back and let the newer mangas take the spotlight. Also, length doesn't matter; it's how you use it, baby." Lavi winked at Allen who blushed brightly. Kanda glared icily at the redhead's back. The baka usagi had better watch it...

Allen shook off his embarrassment and went back to defending his favorite manga. "One Piece is better! I don't know how Kanda could like Bleach more!" Kanda shrugged.

"Bleach...katanas, Mugen...katana. Do I need to spell it out for you?" the samurai drawled. Allen rolled his eyes. At that moment Lenalee and Miranda walked into the room.

"Hey guys. Whatcha talkin' about?" Lenalee asked innocently, Miranda nodded in agreement. Lavi gave the two a toothy grin.

"We're debating which manga is better, Bleach or One Piece. Which, by the way is _so_ Bleach."

"Shove it, Lavi. And no, it is _so_ not. One Piece is the best. Period." Allen interjected, looking thoughtfully at Miranda and Lenalee for a moment. "Hm...what do _you two _think?" Allen asked. All eyes turned on the newly arrived exorcists. Lenalee and Miranda were silent for a minute before giving each other a look and silently agreeing.

"Neither." Miranda replied. Lenalee nodded. Silence. Lavi tilted his head to the side.

"...What?" he asked.

"Do you...do you like...Naruto...or something?" Allen stuttered. Lenalee shook her head. Okay, now he was confused. Those were the Big Three..so...

"DBZ, FMA, Yu Yu Hakusho, Gundam, Trigun, Hellsing, etc.?" Kanda offered. Miranda shook her head 'no'.

"Uh, shojo?" Lavi asked. Both Lenalee and Miranda shook their head now.

"We're not exactly manga fans, Lavi. At least not like you guys are. You see...we're..." Lenalee trailed off.

"Yaoi fangirls." Miranda finished for her. Again, silence. Then when their words finally sunk in, Allen, Lavi, and Kanda's faces started to get very pale. Yaoi fangirls...oh shit.

"Ah! Allen, I almost forgot!" Lenalee exclaimed.

"Forgot what?" Allen frowned nervously. He was still a little bit shaken up with this recent revelation..

"You're a girl now, yeah? So we'd like introduce you to _our_ favorite brand of anime/manga." Allen blanched. Oh shit-monkeys.

"You don't mean...*gulp* yaoi?" he squeaked. Miranda gave him a comforting smile that unsurprisingly, did nothing to comfort the feeling of impending doom in Allen's tummy. Kanda and Lavi gave their 'female' friend a genuinely sorry look. The poor, poor kid. "I-I don't wanna!" Allen cried, scooting back a bit. Lenalee took him by the hand.

"C'mon, Allen. You never know, you might like it.." she coaxed, pulling Allen forward and onto his feet.

"No...no! I don't wanna! No yaoi! No yaoi!" he cried. Lenalee kept pulling him along, conversing quietly with Miranda.

"Junjou Romantica? Gakuen Heaven?" she suggested. Miranda shook her head.

"No, no. I think we should start with something light. Maybe some doujinshi of One Piece..?"

"Ehh...maybe. I'm not really a fan of the yaoi couples there." Miranda nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, we'll figure it out on our way there..." Lenalee said as the three exited the room, leaving Kanda and Lavi alone to shake their heads in sadness. The many horrors that boy was going to face..the poor bastard.

**Owari**

A/N- dammit...kanda kidnapped me...and sobb...i only just managed to find my way out of the pantry. T~T yes, i always figured that lenalee and miranda were yaoi fangirls. i doubt they will get allen to convert though. coz it'd be damn weird to write the romance between him and all the bishies if allen's going "OH HOT DAMN. AW, FUCK YEAH. YAOI TIME. RAVISH ME NOW, MANBITCH." at everyone. ...wait. Owo

hell yeah. got this chapter done because of a SNOW DAY. :DD

anyways, yeah. this is the chapter. PleASeseeeeeeee forgive the long wait. i have midterms coming VERYYYYYY soon and early february i've got jet off for the ACTs. gahh. not a lot of time to write yaoi. but...i did write on fic during xmas break. you..you should go read it...and leave me a review. o.o in the meantime i've got to start studying (or attempting to..) and i'll work on the next chapter. promise it'll have more fluff and shit that you guys dig. unless you already dig this chapter. if so...cool. =w=)b

**i wanna get to 155 reviews...really bad. please...i'll write the 155th reviewer a giftfic if you want. TT_TT but those are my terms for the next chapter. sorry, i'm a selfish author-bitch-lady. XDD READ AND REVIEW, DAMMIT. **(good god, i thought i'd never be done with this chapter..) **(K/N- AND VOTE ON THE POLL. PREFERABLY FOR ME, Yuu Kanda. 'CAUSE I WANNA BE THE MOYASHI'S MANBITCH!) (Allen- Say whaaaat? OAO) **


	6. Chapter 6

A/N- WELL. i seemed to have left all my spanish shit at school and i have un muy grande essay due manana. fuck my life. soo i have free time right now. might as well pick this thing up from doc manager and shine 'er up, yea?

anyways, enjoy. remember to review and vote when you're done reading my bullshit. :3 i always listen to music as i write and a lot of time the feeling i get from the songs are inspiration for my stories so i thought i might as well give you all the song that gave me the most plotbunnies.

Playlist- Ain't No Rest For The Wicked by Cage the Elephant (it applies to a lot of villains, at least i think so. :D) this and c.n blue helped me a lot. thank gott for korean music! xD

Disclaimer- don't own. don't sue.

* * *

**Chapter Six**

**Invitation**

_London, England_

_Cyril's Estate_

"Goodness, did you take a long while to awaken." Cyril noted, gazing calmly at the young man dressed in hobo attire. The young man paused in his shoveling of various foods into his mouth to roll his eyes, three eyes to be exact, at the elder Noah.

"Forgive me. Death is not easy to overcome." he snipped back. Cyril sighed. Why did he have to get stuck with the new brat? And where was Road? He'd seen the girl in the Noahscape but she'd disappeared into thin air after that. Cyril felt his paranoid/protective instincts creep over him. The younger Noah glanced at him and snorted. Idiot complex. "Don't get your man-panties in a bunch. Road's fine." Cyril glared at him.

"How do you know that! She could have been attacked! Or fallen over and hurt her knee! Oh, Road~!" Cyril cried. His poor baby girl. Just then said baby girl arrived through the door. The younger Noah gave him an 'I told you so' grunt which was promptly ignored. Road skipped into the room, all smiles and rainbows.

"Wisely!" she exclaimed, running over to the hobo and hugging him. "It's been so long!" Wisely hugged her back with one arm, the other holding up a mug of hot tea. His vessel was a Brit, after all. Tea was a must. He smirked a bit.

"Yeah, good to see you too, Road." he paused to give her a once-over. She'd changed in the past thirty-five years. "You've gotten a lot shorter since I last saw you. What, Cyril leave you in the dryer too long?" Wisely asked jokingly. Cyril fumed at the teasing Noah while Road giggled playfully. It was true she had gotten a lot shorter. She'd given up her older body for one of a child. It wasn't too much of a difference though, she was around nineteen before and now she was around twelve or thirteen. Road couldn't keep track.

"Ha, ha. No, I just like being a kid more." Road looked at Wisely's...poor choice of clothing. "Speaking of change, did you lose your sense of fashion while you were dead? You really cannot pull off hobo-chic."

Wisely snorted. "Well this is the best you can do when you're homeless on the streets of London. Such a dirty city nowadays." he said matter-of-factly, pulling at the ratty scarf around his neck. Road smiled.

"Oh, we'll fix that later. Ah! Guess what I have!" she said. Wisely and Cyril shrugged. Knowing Road it could be anything from a bag of candy to a severed head. Road grinned and produced a black card from her back. She held it up for the younger Noahs to see. (She _was_ the oldest Noah, after all)

It was of medium size and rectangular shape, the sides of the card garnished in pretty silver swirls and crosses. On the center was single, silver apple with two bites taken out of it. The back of the card was adorned with five words in silver cursive. Cyril's lips curved upon seeing the message, as did Road and Wisely's. The Millennium Earl was such a card...

XDXDXD

_St. Petersburg, Russia_

_Ekaterina's POV_

I gasped for air and my limps were moving about sporadically without my control. My head...my head hurt so much. Every single memory and emotion that I had stored away and forgotten was rushing back into me, sweeping me up in the flow. It was a flood of sadness and sentiments and I was sinking in it. Through my tears and hazy vision, I saw Allen and suddenly I felt all my rage directed at her. It was the exorcist's fault, dammit! I wanted to charge at her and wring her stupid neck, but my body convulsed again and yet another memory ripped through me...

I was sitting in my old seat again, with all of Ms. Perovskaya's students. It was a Monday and we were waiting for our teacher to arrive, strangely she was late today. My breath hitched, I remembered this day. The memory continued to play itself out. We waited, and waited, and waited. But she never came. We all waited for four hours for Ms. Perovskaya to show up but she never did. Everyone thought it was strange that she hadn't shown up, much less that she was _late_. She usually showed up an hour earlier to prepare the day's curriculum. Finally we started to filter out of the church and go our separate ways, having concluded that she wouldn't be coming that day.

Deciding to get something to eat, I headed for the market. My teachings with Ms. Perovskaya had given me the confidence to hold my head high and walk down a street crowded by people without feeling out of place. Most people didn't recognize who I was anyway, and those that did, well, they ran for their life so it was no concern of mine. While purchasing some candy from a vendor, I overhead some women gossiping nearby. It wasn't my intention to eavesdrop but their failed attempts at whispering really made it hard to ignore.

"They've done it! They've finally done it! The czar is dead! They have killed him!" the lady in the fur hat said. The other woman wearing a blue shawl hushed her friend.

"Shh! Quiet! We must not speak so lightly of it. You never know who could be listening." she chided. I indirectly shivered, feeling a bit intrusive listening in on their conversation. Her companion in the fur hat pressed on.

"But, Aggripina, it was the Narodnaya Volya. They were the ones who killed the czar. Why should we have anything to worry about?" she asked. Aggripina sighed and shook her head at her friend's naivety. By now, I was clenching onto the small bag of sweets for my life. The Narodnaya Volya? That...that was the group that Ms. Perovskaya was a part of wasn't she? Her organization had killed the czar? It was almost impossible to believe. The czar was the one who was said to have divine right, a gift from the gods. How had he fallen? And why wasn't the country in complete turmoil yet? Subjects without a king...surely Russia couldn't survive as that.

"Veronika, haven't you heard? The Imperial Police have launched a secret investigation of the Narodnaya Volya. They're trying to keep the czar's death a secret for as long as possible. Can you imagine what would happen if word got out to other nations that Mother Russia was without a ruler?" Veronika's brows furrowed.

"We would be invaded and captured within days." she murmured. Aggripina nodded.

"Not only that. Everything would be chaos." she stopped for a moment then went on. "We should stop talking about this. The police are hunting anyone connected to the Narodnaya Volya down like dogs. Let us go." she finished. Veronika nodded and the two walked away. I, however, was frozen in place. My heart was pounding so hard and I had a feeling of absolute dread. The police...they were hunting the Narodnaya Volya down. That meant they were looking for Ms. Perovskaya as well. She was okay right? Right? I had to speak with her. I had to know what was going to happen to her. To me. To all of us that she had taught.

I stared down on myself with disdain. I wish I could have gone down and slapped myself across the face and told myself to run away. But I didn't. I was just a spectator.

It was the next day and everyone was back at the church again, waiting for Ms. Perovskaya again. I hadn't told anyone else about what I had heard but I could tell some people already knew. They looked every bit as nervous and anxious as I did. We all waited for an hour before we heard someone knock on the door. Everyone thought it was Ms. Perovskaya. It wasn't.

After no one rose from their seats to open the door, (Ms. Perovskaya had the key to the church so there was no need for us to open it), it was broken down and fell onto the ground, ripped from its rusty hinges. Everyone was silent as several large men dressed in matching military suits walked in. I recognized the symbols on their jackets' breastpocket. It was the Okhrana, the secret Russian Imperial police. Ms. Perovskaya had given us a lesson about them. They were cruel men who walked in the shadows and silently took out anyone who presented themselves as a problem to the Royal family.

One man stepped forward and spoke to us a deep, cold voice. "You lot are the students of Sophia Perovskaya, yes? Do not try to say otherwise because we have various pieces of information stating differently." He paused to eye each one of us carefully, looking for any indications of guilt or fear on our faces. Apparently he found some as his mustached lips curved upward. "We want any information on your teacher, Ms. Sophia Perovskaya that may lead to her capture. She's a wanted criminal charged with association to the organization responsible for the death of Czar Nicolas II. You best give up anything you may know on her wherabouts."

No one said anything. However I doubt that any of us even knew anything about where Ms. Perovskaya had gone. She never spoke to us about her other activities or where she went. The Okhrana officer grunted then shook his head.

"You're all a bunch of brainwashed fools, you know that? You sealed your fate when you let that demon woman corrupt your impressionable little minds. It's unfortunate but you all cannot be allowed amongst the Russian people. We can't risk you growing up and tainting other children with ludicrous beliefs and thought of insurgence. You must be disposed of. Goodbye, children." his words still had no effect on us and we could sense that that was getting him riled up. The man turned around and barked some orders to his men who in turn rushed forth and began grabbing us by the arm, leg, neck, hair, whatever. They dragged us down into the church's basement where they began brutally punching and kicking us all into submission and later, death.

I remember the pain that each impact of knuckle or steel-toed boot to my body wielded. I took the merciless punishment in silence, biting _through_ my lower lip to contain the cries and screams welling up inside me. Some of the other students tried to do the same but in the end, the only sound was that of children screaming in torment then the noise our jaws made when kicked or punched broken to quiet us. I think out of the two-hundred and fifty bones in my eight year-old body, a hundred of them had been broken or fractured. I endured the cruel treatment for ten more minutes before at last, I became too exhausted and passed out.

When I awoke, I was fine. My body had healed itself and I was back to normal. I wish I could have said the same for everyone else as well. The basement was devoid of the Okhrana agents and around me were piles of children, my classmates, dead or dying unconsciously. The faint scent of blood was present in the air, I felt like retching. With wobbly legs and a queasy stomach, I found my way out of the basement and ran out of the church. I continued running from that place for a very long time. I was traumatized and untrusting of everyone around me, fearing they might be an Okhrana agent seeking out more 'tainted' children. Over time, I learned that Ms. Perovskaya, along with most of the other Narodnaya Volya members had been apprehended and scheduled for execution.

The revolution they had desperately been fighting for was never achieved. At least, not in their lifetime.

Eventually I found Ms. Perovskaya's grave. I had searched for it in order to curse her in death for everything that had happened to me and all her students because of her brashness. But when I found the tombstone I broke down crying, unable to utter anything coherent against her. In truth, Ms. Perovskaya was the closest thing I had ever had to a mother, as sad and as cliche as it was. My real parents had either been hateful or scared for me for what would later be known to be as 'my Innocence'. Ms. Perovskaya had taken me, and all the other students, under her wing and educated us. And no matter how things ended up, with most of us students dead and the Narodnaya Volya disgracefully hung, I didn't regret it.

That was went the Millennium Earl presented himself to me and opened my eyes about my Innocence. The Dark Matter he put inside me was both a gift and brand on my neck. I was eternally grateful to him and thus took upon the job he had given me. To hunt and to kill exorcists and extract their Innocence. I carried those missions out with Mother, another gift from the Earl. For a while, I truly thought I was doing the exorcists a favor by removing their Innocence and allowing them to move to a higher plane of existence. In my days of 'running', I had attempted that many times to commit suicide but was never successful due to the burden of my Innocence. It would not allow me to die.

In total Mother and I have killed a total of forty-three finders and seven exorcists. We would use the same tactic every time to lure the Black Order into sending their exorcists to Russia. Start some type of phenomenon in a rundown village then capture the exorcists and possibly their finders sent there. After that we'd kill them and remove the Innocence. That was pretty much our existence throughout the years. But now...this exorcist. Allen Walker...

Finally the memory released its grip on my mind and I dropped to the ground, panting and gulping for air again like a fish out of water. To me, it felt like I was without air for hours, miserably replaying that damned memory but it was actually less than twenty seconds. Allen was on the ground, two meters away from me, watching me intently and pressing her hand over the wound on her arm to quell the bleeding. Something hit me. What if...what if she saw what had happened between the Earl and I. Then that meant she saw me get branded. I looked at Allen with a horrified expression on my face. Shit!

The look in Allen's eyes clearly said that she was aware of what she had just seen. Dammit, suddenly I felt very low and ashamed...two more feelings/emotions that had resurfaced thanks to Allen. To have someone witness me become less than human, no matter how grateful I was for it. It was the greatest indignity possible for me. God, I wanted dearly to punch Allen's lights out.

Allen sensed my hostility and inched towards me, eyes still wide with that same 'sympathetic' (emphasis on 'pathetic') look in her eyes. It just pissed me off further. She even had the gall to speak to me in a time like this. "Look, Ekaterina...I-I saw what happened...with the Earl." she stammered. I was exhausted and mentally worn out but I still managed to shoot the pissant exorcist a glare that warned her to back the hell up.

Allen went on. "I just...I want you to know that I...understand..." she was choosing her words very carefully, I could tell. But not carefully enough. At the word 'understand' my eyes snapped open and widened. What the hell does that little bitch _understand_ about me? She doesn't know me, who I am or what the hell I've gone through. All she saw was one tiny, _miniscule _event in my life and she thinks she's fucking Saint of Bullshit Sympathy? It drove me up the wall. I started pulling myself up from the floor with great difficulty, using my newfound rage as fuel to do so. If Allen were smart, she'd shut up and leave this place before I had the chance to wrap my hands around her neck like she did me.

But for some reason, Allen _still_ didn't shut up. "I know you probably don't believe me," No shit, Sherlock. "But...I, no, the Black Order can help y-" This was where I drew the line.

"For the love of _God__. Shut. Up._" I bit out. There was a long pause before I continued speaking. "I don't want your damn help, okay? I don't give a shit what you, your friends, or the Black Order could do to 'help' me. I neither need or want handouts from anyone." That was the most civil way I could put it since the default to that was rampant cursing and screaming. Allen frowned.

Her eyes darkened as he muttered quietly, "I know what you've been through...". But it wasn't quiet enough.

"SHUT THE HELL UP! WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU KNOW, HUH?" I screamed at her. Allen looked surprised, hell, I'm a little surprised myself. I went on, screaming still. "YOU'RE NOTHING BUT A VATICAN DOG. A SHITTY PUPPET THAT THEY'LL JUST THROW AWAY WHEN YOU'RE NO GOOD!" when I finished screaming my face off, I found myself crying and out of breath. Allen was still gazing at me with the same annoying as fuck eyes of hers. What I wouldn't give to rip them out.

Allen doesn't speak so I spoke instead. There's just so much rage, it's as if it just appeared out of nowhere. I assumed it's all been pent up emotions I've kept inside myself for so long. The sadness from when I was with my family. The grief when my entire village died of typhoid. The joy and sorrow I experienced in my time with Ms. Perovskaya. Then the loneliness I bared after she died. Everything's just been transfered into one feeling, one emotion. Anger.

"You...you're not above me. Not even. You don't come close to me at all." Allen doesn't look phased. "You're worthless, do you hear me..?"

I'm out of breath and my chest kept heaving with both exhaustion and the difficulty that came with crying. In one final attempt, I pushed myself off the ground and created a copper scythe with a long, knobbly blade.

"WHY DON'T YOU JUST DIE!" I bellowed, swinging the scythe down on her head. Allen still didn't move an inch. Seeing this, my bloodshot eyes widened further as I charged several hundred volts of electricity into the scythe.

_BANG!_

I gasped as my body turned rigid as stone for the second time this day. The scythe dropped from my hands and fell clattering onto the ground. I looked down on my knee- it had a bullethole cutting clean through it.

"AGHHHH!" I screamed, falling crumpled onto the ground holding the wound. I looked around with wild eyes for the gunman but I only saw Allen, who was now up on her feet and walking towards me. The wounded exorcist approached me and knelt down, holding me in her arms. I looked up at her in shock.

"Please...don't do this to yourself anymore. The Earl is evil and has been using you as a means to further his goals. You're not a monster, a witch, or anything." I gasped. She had seen that too? "You are you. Ekaterina...Kurae." Upon hearing that, I burst out into tears, my sobbing coming out ragged and labored. I couldn't think, speak, or do anything but cry in Allen's arms for a while. Allen simply held my head gently and waited patiently as I wept.

However, that was when something within me snapped and my neck began to burn as much as the day I'd been marked.

XDXDXD

_Earlier, With Tune_

_Tune's POV_

I woke up when I heard Allen screaming, it came out of nowhere and easily broke my slumber. I found myself trapped in a dimly lit storage closet in an unknown building, surrounded by boxes. With haste, I ran out the door and into the corridor to look out the large doorway parallel to the room I was just in. What I saw confounded me. I watched as Allen, being controlled by his Innocence mercilessly attacked Ekaterina. From a broken window, I saw Kanda engaging in battle with a demonic-looking copper automaton. In that moment I knew that there was nothing for me to do to help Allen or Kanda. I was just a finder, a normal human being with any fantastical abilities or Innocence.

But the one thing I did have, was knowledge. Knowledge in chemical compounds and combustive reactions, in short, I was an explosives specialist. A chemistry nerd. Yeah.

Honestly, it'd just started as a hobby I had before I knew of the Black Order and something I used to play pranks on my older brother, Noise. (I'd even blown off most of his hair one time, even now it'd hadn't fully grown back. He used to have long, hippie-like hair..) But when I joined the Black Order to assist Noise, I quickly learned that us finders are at a great disadvantage. Lacking Innocence or any combative training, on the battlefield we were like pigs to the slaughter. So I had developed my love for chemistry and all things that go 'boom!' for combat scenarios in order to defend myself and those around me.

I hurried back to my room and rummaged through the boxes in the storage room, finding various typical household items, like cleaner fluid and aluminum foil. I smirked to myself. Perfect. Rolling up pieces of aluminum foil into balls and placing them into cans of cleaner fluid (containing hydrochloric acid) would make a very nice diversion. I began to pull out several more other useful things, organizing them into neat piles for my later use. From the folds of my jacket I produced eight medium sized sticks of dynamite. Three of them were wet and couldn't be used, but no matter I still had five sticks. I also brought for a chuck of C-4 and composition B. (Hey, I'm a pyromaniac. What can you do?) I grinned widely to myself again.

Yes, this would definitely work. I immediately got to working, using all intel on chemistry to build and set up bombs for now, later, and after.

In the end, I'd succeeded in creating over two dozen 'bottle bombs' for diversion, three sticky bombs in both this room, the pastor's office, the basement entrance, and inconspicuously hidden in the large room where Allen and Ekaterina were fighting. They all had one fuse, interconnecting each other so they'd go off simultaneously. Finally, from my coat pocket I took out my lighter and flicked it on, making a flame come out. Yes, it was still working as well. I still had a fighting chance in this battle. I prepared myself and walked out of the storage room.

XDXDXD

_Allen's POV_

I didn't have any clue what the hell was going on. One moment, Ekaterina was crying like a child (which she was, but still..) then the next she flips out and starts coming at me again with that freaky scythe of hers, aiming to chop my head off. Seriously, what the hell? Did we not just an emotional heart-felt moment of mushiness? Does that not mean anything in this day and age anymore? Two more sharp, copper projectiles zoomed past my head, courtesy of Ekaterina, of course. I grunted to myself, apparently it did not.

But all kidding aside, something did feel very off about Ekaterina. Her attacks were far less calculated and more brute force than anything. She looked ragged and was breathing in sharp, shallow pants whenever she got the chance to and many of her wounds had opened up again and started seeping blood. I knew I was almost equally as beaten up as Ekaterina, but jeez, it was like something was forcing her to keep on fighting and by the rate she was going, it wouldn't be long until her body gave in or bled out. Either one was plausible. I didn't want to hurt her any further but I couldn't just keep blocking and dodging her attacks anymore, I didn't have the stamina for it. I had to do something to incapacitate Ekaterina until she came to her senses or something.

'Okay! Last chance now..' I thought to myself as I launched forward heading straight for Ekaterina and her frightening scythe, poised to lob me in half. Just as Ekaterina was about to swing her scythe, I used Crown Clown's speed and dodged the attack, appearing on her side to deliver a killer roundhouse punch that landing perfectly on the edge of her jaw. Ekaterina's head instantly whipped back from the whiplash, a sizable amount of spit and blood flying from her mouth and she fell to the ground. I silently thanked Jerry for teaching me that punch a while back. He told me that back in his fighting days, the easiest way to get a one-hit KO was to connect your fist and a person's jawline in one big punch and that'd put them out without a doubt. By looks of Ekaterina with her poor self a pile on the floor, it seemed to work.

Breathing a sigh of relief, I fell onto the ground as well, sitting slumped against a broken able. I took a few more breaths to ease my still-hastened heartbeat and observed Ekaterina in silence. I truly felt bad for the girl. My life hadn't exactly been a cakewalk but hers was nothing to scoff at either. Ekaterina had the power of Innocence within her and if only the Black Order had found her before the Earl had, maybe things would have turned out a lot different. I noticed some of her blonde hair had landed close to her mouth (which was bloody from a cut lower lip), frowning, I kneeled forward a bit to move those pale strands away. Big mistake apparently, because Ekaterina, like some ungodly zombie-like creature, snapped open her eyes and grabbed my hand in an unhuman iron grip.

"Shi-!" I yelped, not expecting that in the least. Ekaterina rolled onto her side and pulled me in closer to her. I could do nothing but comply since her hold felt like a pair of iron-cutters clamping down on my wrist. In a matter of minutes, Ekaterina had crawled on top of me, a pair of copper cuffs molded from the ground held my hands in place and her hand had moved from my wrist to my neck, compressing my throat ever so slightly that I was having a bit of trouble breathing. Her free hand was held over my face and covered over in flaky copper, focusing more on her fingers, turning them into long, sharp claws. Despite feeling rather awkward (there's something very wrong with having a little girl clad in a scanty black dress sitting on you as she kept you in a semi-choke hold), I was panicking. I'd exhausted practically all of my power from fighting for so long and I didn't have enough strength to call on Crown Clown anymore.

I shut my eyes as Ekaterina brought down her claw-hand and prayed for a miracle.

_Kaboom!_

And got one in the form of Tune.

* * *

_Normal POV_

Tune moved quickly, chucking his 'bottle bombs' in random directions to confuse the enemy and keep them from figuring out his location. The finder had arrived in the nick of time it seemed and had surprised Ekaterina enough for Allen to grab the hand on his neck and throw the girl off himself. Allen then scrambled to take shelter behind some rubble as Tune continued his barrage of explosives. Ekaterina was still in a shroud of confusion as the possessed girl ran about trying to find whoever was attacking her. But it was no good as the little bombs seemed endless and kept hitting places she was trying to get to. Ekaterina was like an animal trapped in a corner with nowhere to go and surprisingly, it was all thanks to Tune.

As he began running low on his little 'diversion' explosives, Tune started to work on lighting the fuses to the more heavy duty bombs hidden in both the room he was in the other ones down the hall. By this time, Allen had found Tune and reached the finder as he pulled out his lighter and set the fuse ablaze.

"Tune! You're okay, thank goodness!" Allen exclaimed over the popping sounds of the aluminum/HCL bottle bombs going off. The exorcist glanced at the lit fuses being eaten away at by the fire. "Is that-" Tune nodded.

"More explosives. Specifically here and in the back rooms over there," he motioned his head back to the large doorway. "This place is going to go up in flames pretty soon. Where's Kanda? We've got to get out of here immediately." Tune explained, a stern look in his eyes. Allen frowned.

"The last time I checked, Kanda was outside fighting with Ekaterina's 'Mother', but I haven't seen him since. I'm pretty sure he's still outside thought.."

"Then we're set, let's go-"

"Wait!" Allen interjected. "What about Ekaterina?" Tune furrowed his brows.

"What _about_ Ekaterina?" he asked questioningly.

"We can't just leave her here to be blown up!" Allen cried out. The finder looked disbelievingly at the exorcist he was assigned to watch over.

"Allen, as much as I'd _love_ to risk my hide saving the psychopath who tricked us, abducted us and brought us up to this godforsaken place to be slaughtered, we can't. I didn't have enough time to figure out all the calculations while making these bombs so I had to go with my gut instinct sometimes and when it comes to this sort of...explosive science, guts aren't enough to go on. Bad things could happen."

"Bad things like what?" Allen asked. Tune sighed.

"Faulty fuses, premature detonation, et cetera, et cetera," Allen looked horrified. "Look we don't have time to worry about my mistakes, alright? We've got to go. _Now_." Tune said firmly. Allen was silent for a moment but finally gave in, sighing softly in defeat.

"Fine.." he replied softly, getting up and following Tune's lead to the door. But suddenly, a loud bang came from the back of the room and several sounds of collapsing rubble was heard. Ekaterina screamed. Allen turned around and saw the rest of the room erupted in flames, the ceiling had been blown off and several support beams had fallen to the center of the room. One of those beams had landed on Ekaterina's left arm, locking the girl in place. Allen glanced at Tune who face could only be read as 'Oh, crap.'. Premature detonation...oh, crap indeed.

Before Tune could stop him, Allen started running over to help Ekaterina, yelling past his shoulder at Tune for the finder to get out and find Kanda and that he'd be back as soon as possible. Tune really didn't have a choice by to do as told. However something seemed have jammed the door. Ugh. Shit.

XDXDXD

"Ekaterina! Ekaterina, are you okay?" Allen shouted, holding his sleeve over his nose, the smell of smoke was overpowering. From the floor, Ekaterina glared hatefully at the exorcist who'd come to 'rescue' her.

"What the hell kind of question is that, dumbass? My arm's been crushed by this piece of shit and you wanna come and ask me if I'm okay? Fuck off!" she barked back then winced softly as the pain in her shoulder hit sharply again. Bitching did not help.

Allen knelt to the ground and tried to pry the heavy, burning wooden beam off the young girl but it was too much. The thing must have weighed over two-hundred pounds. Even _if_ Allen managed to free Ekaterina's arm, she'd probably never be able to use it again. Allen felt a knot of guilt curl up in his stomach. He gave the girl a once over and found nothing to soothe his worries. Most of her left leg and right shoulder was covered in burns and the skin had already started to form boils blister. The recent burns coupled with past injuries (that were now already bleeding profusely) did not seem to make a positive outlook- not in the least.

Another explosion was heard as one of the back rooms finally blew up as well. So much for a 'simultaneous detonation'. Allen frowned, things weren't looking too good now, were they?

"Not looking too great, huh, Vatican dog?" Ekaterina jeered halfheartedly, sharing the same thoughts. Allen shook his head, the heat from the flames surrounding him making his face flush and eyes sting and water up. (Or at least he liked to blame the fire) God, he felt so useless now. This was a little girl, for heaven's sake, a twisted and devilish one albeit, but a little girl nonetheless. And Allen could do nothing but keep her company for a bit as the world fell apart around them. Literally. Allen hated himself for being able to do nothing.

Ekaterina watched the exorcist, emotionless. Even now this girl was still worrying about her when even she, herself, had given up and accepted fate? Exorcists really were such stupid people...

"Shut up. Stop feeling so sorry for yourself, exorcist. You won, okay? You defeated me and saved your friends. Shouldn't that be enough for you?"

"But you're going to die here!" Allen snapped back. Ekaterina didn't seem to care for his attitude.

"So?" she replied. "I'm fine with it. I had an interesting life and did some pretty wicked things. I'm good." Allen didn't understand this girl. Didn't she understand she was going to _die_ a couple minutes? Why wasn't she fighting back, resisting death with everything she had left in her?

Ekaterina seemed to have read Allen's mind as she answered irritably, "I've already fought my fight and I'm content with that, even if I didn't win." she eyed Allen curiously. "You want to defeat the Earl, don't you?" Allen nodded blankly. "Well then you're still fighting. You've got goals, aspirations, and all that shit. I'm done with mine. Understand? Now get out of here. This place is 'bout to fall apart pretty soon."

"But, I-" Ekaterina grabbed Allen by the collar and pulled him near.

"Shut. _Up_." she growled fiercely. Then she sighed and a tiny sliver of blood slipped from the corner of her lips. "...You can't save everyone." She let him go.

"Wha-?"

"MOYASHI! DAMMIT, MOYASHI, ANSWER ME! WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?" a new voice exploded into the burning room. Allen turned around and his heart clenched. There was Kanda, yelling and sprinting towards him, like some goddamn firefighter fueled by rage and soba. 'He's okay!' Allen thought happily. Ekaterina cocked a brow at the expression on Allen's face then proceeded to shake her head. Stupid love between stupid exorcists.

"Kanda!" Allen breathed out, coughing from all the dust the Japanese man had kicked up.

"Kanda, right?" Ekaterina asked. Both Kanda and Allen looked at her suspiciously.

"What's it to you?" Kanda snapped.

"Catch." she said, pushing Allen hard into Kanda, who caught him awkwardly. "You two lovebirds better get out this place. It's about to blow." Ekaterina advised.

Kanda growled and hoisted the moyashi over his shoulder and took off in the direction of the door. 'Dammit!' the samurai thought angrily. Allen writhed in Kanda's hold, yelling to be put down but Kanda just ignored it, focusing on getting both him and the annoying moyashi to safety.

XDXDXD

Ekaterina laid on the burning ground in silence. The exorcists had finally left and now all that filled her ears was the sound the dry, old wood made as it crackled in the flames. She'd be lying if she said she wasn't just a tiny bit sad about dying. Sure she had accepted it, but that didn't mean the feelings in her chest weren't there. Regret, sorrow, joy, love. The exorcist girl had opened up her Pandora's box and set free all these things Ekaterina had thought she'd forgotten about. Now thinking back, she was grateful that Allen had done so, not that she'd admit that, but being able to experience lost emotions and memories in her final moment was pretty nice. Ekaterina exhaled and felt her mind getting cloudier, losing a bit more of her life with that breath. She watched the burning beam above her with mild interest. It was set to fall very soon and when it did, that would be the end for her.

'Oh..it's finally broken...' Ekaterina thought idly as the large, flaming object splintered off from the ceiling and began its descent. Ekaterina took one last breath of searing-hot, ashen air and closed her eyes.

...But the impact never came. What?

Ekaterina's eyes opened wide in shock. Her 'Mother' had materialized in front of her and was holding the beam back on its arms and shoulders. She hadn't even called out to her...so why?

Strangely now Ekaterina felt something wet slide down her cheeks, burning at the small scratches scattered on her face. Tears. Truly strange.

A break in Mother's infrastructure was audible as the weight of the broken support beam became even too much for Mother to bear. Ekaterina let a smile tug itself at her lips.

"It's okay," she told the mock-Akuma. "Спасибо ."

The beam fell.

XDXDXD

Now a safe distance away from the crumbling church, Allen, Kanda, and Tune watched soundlessly as the church exploded angrily, sending plumes of black smoke into the light gray sky. Kanda grunted. Damn that finder could make some good bombs. (Wonder if he could help him get back at the baka usagi for all those idiotic pranks of his...) Kanda peered at Allen. The moyashi had been strangely quiet as they left the church and ran to find safer grounds. Had he tried to save the girl back in the church? He should have known she was a lost cause...sometimes Kanda couldn't understand Allen.

"Ehh? That's a pretty damn impressive bomb..." an unknown voice quipped, surprising the trio. Allen was the first to turn around. Oh HELL no. "Heh. Which one of you kids made that? You should have seen the shit I blew up with my little chemistry set back in the day.." Allen gaped at the person talking to...well, no one in particular. He seemed to zero in on Allen then scoffed in disbelief, twirling his revolver on his finger before slipping it back in the the holster attached to his long jacket. The jacket that only the Generals of the Black Order wore.

"You know, I came up to this shitty city because I had heard rumors throughout my travels in Russia about a young white-haired beauty in the land. Shame to see it's just you, baka apprentice." Allen and Kanda choked on their breaths.

It was the one, and only elusive womanizer General of the Black Order, Cross Marian.

'Fuck my life.' Allen thought bitterly.

* * *

A/N- ba-bam! cross and the noahs? YEA, SON, YEA. that's what's up. i finally sat my bitchass down and wrote finished this chapter. ughh. such a bitch to write. guhhh. uwahhh. ekat. why you no live? DDD: YES. i know dynamite would make a much larger explosion and ekat probly woulda died right then and there but let's just pretend tune's THAT good of a chemist and knew how to neutralize the dynamite to the extent where multiple explosions would be needed for the whole thing to go kaput. kk? :3

_Terms and Translation _

_Okhrana- secret Russian imperial police. disbanded. known to have used very...unsavory methods to deal with insurgents. _

_Czar Alexander II- assassinated by the narodnaya volya, naturally the nv members were hunted down ruthlessly_

_Спасибо - russian for 'Thank you', pronounced 'spa-see-bah' (thinking back, using cyrillic was stupid cause i doubt you guys know how to pronounce it. mah badddd)_

_(end)_

russia arc ended! FINALLY. yeah! now for the next one. (the noah one. YAYYYYYYYY)

**REVIEW AND VOTE, AS ALWAYS! NEXT UPDATE WILL BE MUCH SOONER! (and way less serious..) BACK TO THE FLUFF, PEOPLE!**


	7. Chapter 7

A/N**- **goodness it's been a while. my writer's block and sheer laziness/procrastination with this and other things has made eliminated any sliver of inspiration or initiative to write for uhh the past year or so. idk. recently my siblings went on a dgm kick and watched all the eps on netflix which made me catch up on the latest chapters of the manga. so i'm ready to go now. seeing as it's been so long, my writing style might have changed...for better or worse, not sure. LOL

let's just get a move on, yeah? ~u ~;;

Disclaimer- I don't own -man, this is a work of fiction..of another work of fiction. :'D

* * *

**Chapter Seven**

**Railroad Liplock**

_A Train in Southeast China_

_Cross' POV_

So back in the outskirts of western Russia, I'd been hearing left and right about a "mystic beauty with hair like starlight". She accordingly had a face like a sweet doll and soft gray eyes that sparkled with mirth. From more lewd sources such as run-down bars and mills, I'd also gathered she had a petite, but sexy body. After hearing such things, how could I pass up the wild goose chase to find this woman and, of course, make her _mine_. I was Cross Marian, after all. I had women falling at my feet left and right to be with me. She would be a piece of cake and another mighty fine notch to my belt.

And so I scoured the country after her, (I was in hiding from the Black Order anyway, wandering around lost in Russian Siberia wouldn't hurt) and as expected, I found her. She and some friends had actually gotten kidnapped in another town and taken to an abandoned mansion. I'd heard about the Ekaterina girl and her creepy mother figure in the past as well. I figured I'd swoop in and save them as well as bust some Akuma ass in my down time. Again, I'm Cross Marian. I do this kind of shit.

But while surveying the mansion from the outside, a massive fight had erupted and the girl and her friends were battling against the crazy child. Strange. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the girl could hold her own. Thus I continued to watch the fight go on until the end when Ekaterina was defeated and the mansion blown apart. I took that moment to arrive in a badass fashion and send the nameless girl head over heels in love. Making a clever quip about my trusty chemistry set from the good old days and twirling my revolvers, I most certainly made an excellent entrance.

I finally laid eyes on the girl and found that all of the rumors were indeed, true. She was quite the looker. Yet something else also dawned on me. That red pentacle scar on her eye only belonged to one person in this world. My baka apprentice, Allen Walker.

What kind of cosmic fuckery was this.

Still, something odd twinged in my chest when I saw Allen as a...female.

Now, don't get it mistaken. Once a baka apprentice, _always_ a baka apprentice. Nothing more, but nothing less was certainly an option. (Debt collector, errand boy, etc.)

The thing I felt was something very strange and foreign to me. I was familiar with romantic emotions, obviously. Again, this is Cross Marian, we're talking about. But this was fairly new.

When I saw Allen, it was akin to seeing a kicked puppy who needed warmth, care...and protection. I wanted to protect my baka apprentice from all harm and rip apart anything that could endanger him, or should I say _her_ now. If anything it was similar to that freak Komui and how he felt about his sister, Lenalee. Oh god. The horror.

Shortly after we'd gotten Allen, the angry Japanese sword boy, and the finder all patched up, we'd hopped on a train heading south through Mongolia and into China. I obviously had no intentions of returning to the European Branch of the Black Order, but I liked to head over to the Asian Branch for some R&R every now and then. Bak wouldn't rat me out to Komui and the others so long as I gave him a few snapshots of Lenalee each time. Freaks. All of them, I say.

Now it was just us four in a secluded train cart on our way to Guangzhou. Allen and I hadn't really spoken since our exchange in Russia and sword boy was never a big one for small talk and the finder kid was just naturally shy, so the ride up till now had been fairly quiet and awkward as hell.

The sword boy was sitting to my right and staring off into the window with Allen and the finder sitting across from us. The three had since changed into some more casual clothes following their battle. A plain blue shirt and dark trousers paired with boots for the boys and Allen a white button down, a pair of black shorts and boots. They weren't the shortest shorts per se, but the amount of leg my baka apprentice was showing was just a little overboard. The idiot probably wasn't aware of all the lecherous thoughts his bare legs would incur in some more...unsavory types of people. (No, I'm not a hypocrite, shut up)

I coughed to get Allen's attention. "Oi. Baka apprentice." His gray eyes moved up from the floor to meet mine and hardened a bit.

"Yes, Master?" In my mind, I twitched from being called "master" by my baka apprentice when he was in such a form, but I didn't falter outwardly.

"Aren't you cold?" I asked trivially as though I was commenting on the weather. Allen blinked, clearly surprised to see I was showing a semblance of concern for his well being. I would be offended, but even I must admit- I never really gave a damn.

...Until now that is.

"Uh, not really..?" he replied, unsure. I grunted in response. God, could this be more awkward.

Suddenly the door to our compartment opened and a lanky fellow with freckles and curly messy hair capped with a server's hat leaned his upper body through the doorway. He smelled strongly of cheap cologne as though he'd rolled around in it prior to coming to work aboard the train today. I frowned at him a bit.

"Yeah, hi, is there anything I can get for you...guys..?" his voice died a little as he looked at each of us before arriving to Allen. Upon seeing my idiot apprentice, his acne covered face darkened a shade and he swallowed dryly. Allen, being naive as he is, simply smiled at the pubescent oaf.

"Oh yes, I'll have another cucumber water, please." the finder requested, failing to read the mood. The dumbass kid just nodded dully, still staring at Allen who by now was getting a bit uncomfortable with the steady stare he was receiving.

"Alright, and you, m'lady?" he asked Allen, throwing in one of the fastest winks I had ever seen.

Allen scratched behind his head and shook his head. Still the server boy pushed on.

"Really? It's my job to make sure your trip is as...pleasurable as possible." he added flirtatiously. Allen nervously chuckled, too polite to do the normal thing and tell him to jump out the window. I was pretty close to breaking the kid's nose with my boot.

"I'm fine. Really. Thanks though." Allen replied kindly.

"Are you sure? If there's anything you need, just ask for my name. I'm-"

"Getting the fuck out of here right now." Kanda interrupted, glaring coldly at the boy. Ah, I'd noticed he'd been really tense since the shitty little flirt got here. I gave him a curious look as he and the kid had a small argument.

"Oh really now? Is there anything I can do for you, sir? Perhaps some ointment for that massive pole up your ass?" Allen chuckled a bit at the kid's remark. Kanda was too enraged to pay any notice.

"Look. You better get your ass out of here before I lose my patience and decide to mount your head on a stick." Kanda growled, his threat obviously a serious one, but the idiot kid before him being such a dumbass, took it lightly.

"Would that be the one lodged between your asscheeks or can you fit another one up there?"

"Alright. That's it." Kanda bit out, rising from his seat and grabbing his katana. Just as he did, Allen stood up to calm him down and keep him from slicing the boy into pieces.

"Kanda, stop! He's just a normal civilian-gah!" Allen's string of excuses for the server was cut short as the train hit a rugged patch in the rail and shook, throwing Allen forward and onto Kanda. A look of horror both passed their eyes as the force of the bump smashed Kanda and Allen's faces together. Not just their noses squashed together but their lips as well. I'm pretty sure my left eyelid visibly twitched.

After a second, the two immediately pulled away from each other. Kanda, spitting profusely with a pink blush peppered across his the bridge of his nose. Allen fell backward into his seat again, rubbing his lips as hard he could, his whole face erupting with a flush of red. The finder was at a lost for words. Kanda and Allen refused to look at each other, both of them staring either at the floor or out the window as though there was a giant, purple floating elephant out there.

"Uh..so...I'm just gonna go now..." the server boy mumbled quietly, sliding the door shut and walking away from the scene. No one made an effort to acknowledge he was ever there, except for the finder.

"Something tells me I'm not gonna get that cucumber water." he sighed.

XDXDXD

_Allen's POV_

Oh god. Oh god. OH GOD.

I _kissed _Kanda. KANDA. Of all people. Him! Kanda Yuu! The guy who annoys me more than anything in this world!

What is this? Is the universe trying to tell me it hates me? Cause I already know it does. Why else would I be stuck in this female body and traveling with my evil master again?

I sighed, curling up in my bunk and pulling myself into a small ball of self-pity. It was late now and all of us had retired to our respective cabins. It seemed Master Cross had a great deal of money in reserve which just pissed me off more since he had had me running around the world making money for him to gamble and spend on women when he obviously had plenty from the start!

Why, whyyyy did I have to meet Master Cross again in this form. This embarrassing female form. My hope had been to contain my small gender bender incident to the confines of the European Branch at the Black Order, but no. No, oh no, Master Cross just had to show up out of nowhere and whisk all of us to the Asia Branch. Now Bak, Fou, Roufa and the others would see me in this state too.

If I could scream I would. But I'd wake up the other passengers.

And it'd sound really girly. So I won't.

I hugged my knees to my chest as tight as I could and sighed. These pajama bottoms Lenalee had packed for me gave for a lot of flexibility. It was strange...and made my legs cold. I tugged the blanket up and wrapped myself up in it, forming a cocoon of bed sheets. I flailed about a bit in sheer anguish of my situation before quieting down. Silence, save for the sound of the train moving against the railroad, filled the cabin. Slowly, my hand moved up and touched my lips. My nose still hurt a ton from when we'd collided but the warm, tingling feeling was still present on my lips.

Unwittingly I relived the kiss in my head. Our heads had crashed into each other and unwillingly, so did our lips. I remembered how Kanda's cold lips felt against mine and how we just stayed like that for a few seconds. Both our eyes were as wide as saucers from the shock, but it was too easy to recall the deep pools of black that were Kanda's eyes. They weren't completely soulless and cold as I had imagined them to be. They were more like round pools of water that were as black as the ocean floor. Up close it's easy to read the emotions Kanda's feeling through his eyes, but far away it just seems like they're empty and angry all the time.

Even if the circumstances were unfortunate...and painful. It wasn't the worst kiss ever.

...Not that I've ever kissed anyone before. Well. Road maybe, but she's crazy.

I've never really been the one to "initiate" the kiss, but I guess this time I was. Making this, my personal "first kiss".

And it was given to Kanda Yuu.

Oh God. The shock is still setting in.

I rolled upside down so my head was facing away the from the door and looking out the window. The tops of trees were passing by rapidly as the train chugged along the side of the mountain. I stared at the moon with its twinkling stars surrounding it and sighed, thinking of how everyone back home was doing.

"I wonder how Lavi and the others are doing..." I mumbled as sleep overcame me.

XDXDXD

_Black Order- European Branch_

_Regular POV_

Lavi leaned out the frame of his open window. His arms were crossed and his chin rested on them comfortably. It was past three by now and everyone except maybe Bookman was asleep by now. Lavi had been up reviewing scriptures as was part of his role as Bookman Jr. It was all stuff he'd read through before, but Lavi had needed something to get his mind off things. He'd been worried about Allen and Kanda lately. They still hadn't come back from their mission and although it was all the way in Russia, Lavi couldn't fathom that their combined strength could be met with any challenge.

Lenalee was just as worried, but then again she was always worried whenever people went off on missions. It was just in her nature. Lavi, however, simply hoped for the best and didn't worry for the most part. Maybe it was because Allen had gone off too. In Allen's current state, Lavi couldn't help but notice he was thinking about his white-haired friend more often than not. Lavi shrugged it off as concern for a friend in a...difficult situation.

Lavi pursed his lips and thought about the first time he'd seen Allen after his transformation. That random meeting in the restroom...his brief infatuation with the "mystery girl"...and the realization it was Allen he'd fallen for. Lavi frowned. But that was over now. Knowing it was still Allen simply in a female form helped Lavi to shut off any of those initial feelings.

He saw Allen as a friend. ...And nothing else.

Right?

'Yes, of course' Lavi thought to himself, answering his own unspoken question.

And that would be true, so long as he kept ignoring any thought in the back of his mind that said otherwise.

Lavi let out a warm puff of breath against the chilly early morning air before standing up straight and stretching. His green eyes stared at the milky, yellow crescent hanging in the indigo sky. The stars seemed to shimmer around the moon lazily. It seemed to bring up an old lullaby Lavi had heard as a child. 'Twinkle twinkle little star...' Lavi thought.

"...How I wonder where you are...Allen..." he murmured softly before retiring to bed.

* * *

A/N- omgggggg. I TYPED THIS ALL IN A DAY. WTF. inspiration is such a tricky bitch at times. it's not the longest, but then again those take a lot of time and effort and i start school in like what. a day? sldkfjsldfk.

all this yullen...i can't take it. i had to add some lonely lavi in the end. ;A ; distance is so awful, poor lavi. i'll try to ease up on the yullen now. or maybe i won't lol. well they're going to the asia branch so that means lulzy fun tiems with bak and the gang. and the noahs are definitely gonna come in soon. lsdkfjslf poker pair. /excited about her own fanfic-what. i still rabu rabu lavi though. /loves all the pairings with allen so like LOL/

if you're still with me, i commend you and for new readers, hello i'm coba the worst updater evar. ; u ; look forward to more updates. i can't guarantee the consistency with when they're posted BUT THIS FIC IS STILL ALIVE. Q A Q;; my inspiration with this fic has definitely been revitalized though.

STAY TUNED AND AS ALWAYS, REVIEW/FAVE/ALERT ETC. feel free to pm or skype me too if you wanna yell at me for not updating or just say hi. = u =; SEE YOU GUYS WHEN I SEE YOU. 3


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